Fall seems like a good time to prune shrubs, but it's not. When we are doing other big end-of-the-season clean-up jobs like raking leaves, taking out the vegetable garden and mulching, it seems logical to do some pruning of shrubs and trees. Resist the temptation! The shrubs are preparing themselves for winter and they have biological things going on that can be interrupted by pruning. This can weaken the shrub and possibly ruin it's blooming ability for the next year.
SPRING! Spring is the best time to do major pruning; roses, fruit trees, flowering perennials, lavender, can all be pruned in March. Flowering shrubs like lilacs, forsythia and viburnum should be pruned after they bloom - June.
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| Rose of Sharon - prune in Spring so flower buds can form over the summer |
Oh, this is so true. I finally convinced my in-laws to stop having their lawn guy hack all their shrubs down in the fall. They planted a lilac years ago and since it has been pruned every fall in "the great yard cleanup" it has never bloomed. Hopefully this spring they'll have some blossoms to enjoy.
ReplyDeleteIt was a privilege to meet Dale Botha because he helped me to clear the construction site by removal of unwanted trees and bushes, and pruning the rest of them in a planned way. He is actually an experienced arborist, and I liked his innovative ideas about garden makeover very much.
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