Knowing How And When To Prune Which Plants
Most plants benefit from some kind of regular pruning and maintenance. You should know when to prune what. A considerable number of blooming and fruiting plants want to be pruned while they are lethargic, in late winter through early spring. A few, such as spring blossoming trees and bushes, will begin setting new buds when the old buds have fallen. These should be pruned soon after blossoming, or you risk pruning off the new buds with the old. Different plants should be constantly pruned and deadheaded, to stay vivacious and in bloom.
Pruning at the wrong time of the year may bring less blooms and fruits, however usually it won’t hurt the plant over a longer period of time. The exception to this is pruning very late in the season and empowering a considerable measure of delicate, new development that will be killed back with the onset of winter climate. Here are some advice to help you realize when to prune the plants in your garden.
Pruning Tools
Whatever plants you have, the primary thing you have to consider is the most ideal tool for this action. Sharp, clean tools make the pruning plants simpler, they are significant to keeping your plants healthy. The four fundamental tools required for pruning most plants are hand pruners, loppers, shearers, and saws.
Flowering Trees, Shrubs, and Vines
Maybe the most confusing group of plants, with regards to pruning times, is blossoming trees and shrubs. A general dependable guideline is to prune in the summer and fall blossoming trees and shrubs in the lethargic season (late winter/early spring) and to prune spring blooming trees and shrubs not long after their blooms fade.
The perplexity accompanies plants like hydrangeas, roses, and clematis; some of these blossom in spring, some in summer or fall, some bloom over and over. Here are a few rules for making sense of when your specific assortment is best pruned.
Clematis: Spring bloomers – Prune them as soon as they finish blooming in the spring
Summer and fall bloomers – You don’t have to prune them, but because they will continue to grow and may be tangled, you can prune them while dormant or when just waking out of dormancy.
Repeat bloomers – The most straightforward approach is to watch the plant and figure out which season offers the best flowers and after that do your pruning as needs be. Treat this pruning more like deadheading or a way to thin out the plant. Don’t be very rigorous.
Hydrangeas: Bigleaf or Florist Hydrangea – Prune in the summer, after the flowers fade
Hills-of-Snow or Sevenbark Hydrangea, Oakleaf Hydrangea, Peegee Hydrangea, Tea of Heaven – Prune in late winter or early spring pruning
Climbing Hydrangea – Prune as needed to control growth
Trees and Shrubs: Azalea, Beautybush, Bridal Wreath Spirea, Flowering Crabapple, Forsythia, Hawthorn, Bigleaf Hydrangea, Lilac, Magnolia, Mockorange, Mountain Laurel, Rhododendron, Serviceberry, Slender Deutzia, Weigela – Prune in Late Spring/Summer, After Bloom
Bradford Pear, Butterfly Bush, Crape Myrtle , Flowering Dogwood , Flowering Plum ,Glossy Abelia ,Golden Rain Tree , Honeysuckle , Hydrangea, Peegee ,Potentilla, Redbud, Spirea (except Bridal Wreath), Wisteria – Prune in Early Spring, While Dormant
Fruit Trees and Berry Plants
Most fruiting plants should be pruned while they are lethargic. They typically get one opportunity to set buds for next season’s product, so specific care is brought with fruit trees and berry plants. Most blossoming plants developed for their decorative value will in any case give you some kind of show, even if you’ve been lax about regular pruning. Fruit trees and berries will relentlessly decay unless they are pruned and tended. There are a few explanations behind this, including suckers that immediate vitality far from fruiting branches, more seasoned branches weakness to maladies and bugs and the habit of many fruiting plants to only produce on branches of a certain age. So if you are developing tree fruits or berries to harvest, pruning them should be given high priority.
Evergreens
Evergreen trees shouldn’t be pruned. It is not prescribed that you utilize pruning to hold an evergreen tree’s size within proper limits. You will simply push and misshape the tree by doing that. Better to pick a smaller, dwarf evergreen than attempting to measure down a vast tree. In any case, there are times when you need an evergreen in your garden to be somewhat more full and that can be expert with some all around coordinated pruning. Remember, the bigger the tree, the more work concentrated this sort of pruning will be, so do this while the tree is youthful.
Perennial Bedding Plants
Maybe the most work concentrated plants to prune are the non-woody perennials. The idea that you can plant perennials once and afterward have an upkeep free garden perpetually is simply not true. Most enduring plants, particularly the blossoming ones, not just should be decreased completely sooner or later before or after the developing season, they require standard pruning, shearing or deadheading. Which plants to prune, when and the amount to prune them is something you learn as you acquire experience gardening. It’s a piece of the joy of planting for most gardeners and it’s the sort of information that differs from area to area.
Suggested Perennial Plants to Prune in the Spring
Artemisia, Asters, Astilbe, Balloon Flowe, Basket-of-Gold , Bear’s Breeches, Black-eyed Susan, Blue Mist Shrub, Butterfly Bush, Butterfly Weed, Campanula, Cardinal Flower, Coral Bells, Cushion Spurge , Delphinium, Dianthus, Foamflower , Foxglove, Perennial, Fringed Leaf Bleeding Heart, Gas Plant, Gayfeather, Geum, Globe Thistle , Goldenrod , Heartleaf Bergenia, Hosta, Italian Bugloss , Joe-Pye Weed, Lady’s Mantle, Lamb’s Ear, Lavender, Lavender Cotton, Lupine, Mums, Oriental Poppy, Pincushion Flower, Plumbago, Purple Coneflowers, Queen-of-the-Prairie /Queen-of-the-Meadow, Red-Hot Poker, Russian Sage, Sea Lavender, Sea Holly, Sedum, Tickseed, Turtlehead, Valerian, Jupiter’s Beard, Wand Flower, Willow Amsonia.
Perennial Plants to Cut Back in the Fall
Bearded Iris, Beebalm, Blackberry Lily, Blanket Flower, Bronze Fennel, Catmint, Columbine, Corydalis, Crocosmia, Daylily, Golden Marguerite, Goldenstar, Ground Clematis, Hardy Bergonia, Helianthus (Perennial varieties), Hollyhock Mallow, Japanese Anemone, Ligularia, Lilyleaf Ladybell, Masterwort, Meadow Rue, Mountain Bluet, Painted Daisy, Penstemon, Peony, Perennial Sunflower, Phlox, Plume Poppy, Salvia, Siberian Bugloss, Sneezeweed, Solomon’s Seal, Veronica/Spike Speedwell, Wild or False Indigo, Yarrow.
