| General Description | Juniperus horizontalis ‘Pancake’ is one of the lowest-growing creeping junipers, with long trailing, layered branches forming a lush blue-green carpet. |
| ID Characteristic | This shrub's most notable characteristics are its very low growing tendency, soft, dense, blue-green foliage, and pale lavender winter colour. |
| Shape | A low-growing shrub with long trailing branches that form a lush mat. To gain additional height, steak stem. |
| Landscape | This creeping juniper is best used in massing as a groundcover in naturalized landscapes, rock gardens, xeriscape, and at the edge of retaining walls. This cultivar is also suitable for inclines too sloped to maintain the grass on. |
| Propagation | Propagate by softwood cuttings. Remove a 20 - 25 cm long cutting from the current year's new growth, from spring to early autumn. Remove foliage from the lower third of the cutting before potting in a soil-less media mix of peat moss and vermiculite. Optionally, apply rooting hormone to the cutting before potting. Next, water, mist, and cover the soft-wood cutting with a plastic bag or dome to increase humidity. The Juniper cutting should root in 8 weeks and be ready for outdoor transplant the following spring. |
| Cultivation | Grow in full sun, dry to moderately moist, well-drained soil. It is very tolerant of salt, pollution, and dry winy locations. This plant will not tolerate standing water. Water frequently upon initial transplant until a deep root system is established. |
| Pests | J. horizontalis is known to experience the following problems: Phomopsis (Juniper tip blight), spider mites, and bagworms. |
| Notable Specimens | The Missouri Botanical Garden, located at 4344 Shaw Boulevard in St. Louis, Missouri. |
| Habitat | Horticultural origin. |
| Bark/Stem Description | Bark is brown with some red tones, exfoliating, typically hidden by layers of trailing foliage. |
| Flower/Leaf Bud Description | The shrub's leaf buds are small, green-blue, and inconspicuous. |
| Leaf Description | The Pancake Creeping Juniper has feathery, elliptic, deep blue-green scale-like foliage that takes on a slight purple hue in the winter. |
| Flower Description | Non-Flowering. |
| Fruit Description | This cultivar rarely produces fleshy berry-like cones, blue-green in colour, and semi-globose in shape. |
| Colour Description | The leaves begin as dark blue-green and shift to a dull blue-purple colour in winter. The cones are a dull green-blue colour. The bark is a reddish-brown colour hidden beneath a carpet of foliage. |
| Texture Description | This is a medium to fine-texture plant. The bark is slightly exfoliating and the foliage is softer than most junipers. |