Pruning: a Skillful Art

Pruning is the practice of removing dead, diseased or otherwise unwanted portions from a plant . The purpose of pruning is to shape the plant by controlling or directing plant growth, to maintain the health of the plant, or to increase the yield or quality of flowers and fruits.

Proper pruning is as much a skill as it is an art, since badly pruned plants can become diseased or grow in undesirable ways.

Timing is also very important when pruning a plant. Especially the early spring blooming plants should be pruned immediately after they have finished flowering. This is because the plant sets its flower buds in the current growing season to bloom next year in spring. So it you prune such a plant late in season, it will fail to bloom the following spring.

Every plant has a different style of pruning too. So before to take the plunge to chop the plant, just make sure you know how exactly it should be done. I am making this a point just because I messed up with my Lilacs once last year.

With Lilacs it is said you should prune only 1/3rd of the flower stem immediately after the bloom period. And it seems I pruned the entire flower stems. The plant grew very nicely in spring, but it failed to bloom which made me realize I did wrong pruning.

After a lengthy winter, spring brings the eagerness of blooms in the garden. But, even a small wrong step could put you on a long wait.

View of the plant, immediately after planting....
The first blooms of the lilac, following spring...
Due to the wrong pruning, there were no blooms this spring....

Spring shrubs in bloom

Spring brings a lot of excitement and activity in the garden. With trees like crabapples & flowering pear blooming early in spring, there are couple of shrubs too that bloom in the same period in our garden. Lilacs & Weigelas are among these. Both the shrubs have totally different personalities and characters.

"Miss Kim" lilac has soft delicate lavender color blooms. The blooms are so fragrant that the whole patio lingers with the sweet fragrance.

"Red prince" Weigela has bold trumpet shaped blooms. The color really appeals the eye and the blooms drooping down in clusters looks very attractive.

Extended West side bedline

In the L-shaped bedline post I mentioned that the bedline extends all the way on the West side of the fence, crossing the fence and continuing in the front yard.

After the Vanderwolf pines is a flowering crabapple on the outside of fence, surrounded by some lilacs inside and outside the fence. This continues with couple of maiden grass and some sunny border speedwell. The extreme corner of the fence is highlighted with a gracefully arching tree called Honeylocust. This is followed by some tall deciduous shrub called Witchhazels which are known for the earliest spring attraction. The witchhazels are surrounded by some flowering perennials called "Moonshine yarrow" and some deciduous shrub Spirea.

On the outside of the fence, the bedline follows a curve pattern leaving a concave area of grass. Onto the extreme other end there are some Karl Forester grass and some Sea green juniper.

Our first garden bed

With arrival of spring in 2006, we decided to start working on our first garden bed in the bird feeder and bird bath area. The main goal was to provide some hiding spaces for the birds when they visit this area.

The plan for this area was to have a spring flowering shrub, Lilac to be surrounded with some evergreen boxwoods and some daylilies in the border. We managed to complete the work in one weekend. Our lilac had its first bloom in couple of days. The fragrance of the blooms lingered in the patio for days. The daylilies started having couple of blooms everyday

Birds seemed happy with the new hiding spaces around the bushes. And we were very much delgihted with the beauty of our new garden.

Here is a snapshot of the garden.