Question
Hi! I live in Ohio. Im hoping you can help me 1) find out what this ugly shrub is and 2)what to do about some disease that it has. The shrub is about 10 years old. It is small and has very waxie lookingleaves.there is some red tinge to them. the leaves are long oval leaves that come to a point.  It has the tinest white flowers(they are hardly noticable) in clusters in the spring and In the fall it gets a few blackish- blue berries. Its ugly enough on its own but, I think it has some kind of disease.It gets black spots all over it and looks SO unhealthy...the same spots are effecting the azailas near by. The are just so sickly looking and have been this way for years. any hope? grandma doesnt like change! thanks, Jonnie

Answer
Jonnie,
I would hazard a guess as to the identity of the shrub as a cultivar of either Inkberry or Japanese Holly. Both species have the leaf texture that you describe and hasve been cross bred to have multicolored leaves, and they both have many varieties with bluish/black berries. I could give you a definate identification if you could e-mail me a high resolution picture of the entire plant and a close up of the leaves. Send it to [email protected].
The spots that you see could be a leaf spot disease that attacks these plants. I would recommend treating them with a fungicide in the spring to control this problem.
Good luck.
Ed Gulliksen