Hello beautiful gardeners! We had alot of questions about pruning this week- everyone is itching to get the landscape and gardens back in shape.... (haha, pun intended!) If you are pruning a flowering shrub, you need to know if it blooms early in the spring (before May) or early summer/summer/autumn. Shrubs that bloom early each year made flower buds last summer. If you prune them now, you will be cutting off flowers. Examples: Azaleas, Rhododendron, Lilacs, Mockorange, early blooming Clematis. Shrubs such as Butterfly bush, Knockout roses, Roses, summer blooming Spirea, Summer blooming clematis make new flower buds each spring as they grow. So by giving them a chopping, you will cause more new growth, hence more flowers. When pruning, it is best to prune 1/4 inch above a set of leaf buds, slightly at an angle. There is a-whole-lot of hedge trimmers firing up right now controlling everything into squares and meatballs. Yuck. I actually like the formal look of that in front of certain houses, but for the most part I believe people are doing it because either they think that is what they are supposed to do (the neighbor across the street does it that way...), or the shrubs they have get too big if they don't prune them back (shrubs and trees never get too big, we don't plan and research our choices properly), or there are some serious control issues going on in the head of the gardener doing it. I actually saw ornamental grasses cut into squares last autumn!!! Plan accordingly and develop a low maintenance garden that doesn't need to be controlled. It is fabulous (and low maintenance) to let your garden be free flowing and natural looking.

One of the biggest pruning mis-steps is with Hydrangea. They really look "sticky and deadish" for awhile in to mid-late spring. If you prune them down now, you are most likely removing flower buds. The exception is the white flowering ones, which seem to be the ones you do want to whack. The ones that get colored flowers should only have last year's dead flowers removed to the first set of buds. You can't imagine how many people call us in July and August and want to know why their Hydrangea didn't bloom again this year. First question from us..."when did you prune it?" Crape Myrtle are another confuser. Back in the day, the varieties weren't so hardy, so they were pruned to the ground to start anew each year. The today varieties are hardy and only should be lightly pruned to remove any winter killed twigs after they leaf out (usually not til the 2nd week of May- they wake up very slow each year, don't think they are dead!!) Pruning them hard can remove a full month of flowers from your summer! There are varieties of Crape Myrtle that aren't cold hardy here in central PA (of course HG researches all of ours to make sure they are....)  If you aren't sure- "To prune or not to prune.....that is the question..." then call HG and we will be happy to steer you in the proper chopping direction.

Keep those pruning tools sharp! Happy brisk day! ~Erica