Before grabbing the secateurs, first distinguish between wood and flower buds. Wood buds grow leaves and branches, and tend to appear longer and thinner. Flower buds are short and round, and grow flowers and fruits.
Because deciduous plants and trees lie dormant during winter, their bare stems make it easier to see their structure and what needs thinning out or cutting back.
Positive pruning advice
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Always cut just above the node (where leaves, buds and shoots emerge from the stem) to prevent ‘dieback’ and disease.
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Remove small, overcrowded branches to stop leaves going mouldy. This reduces the risk of pests and diseases, and allows air and sunlight to get between the vegetation.
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Sharpen your tools for safe and easy pruning – a messy cut takes longer to heal on a plant. Choose secateurs for easy snipping, and loppers or an electric pruner for thick stems.
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Disinfect your tools after use to prevent spreading disease such as canker between plants.
Common pruning mistakes to avoid
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Leave pruning fruit trees such as cherries or plums until early or midsummer to prevent silver leaf, a fungal disease.
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Try not to cut off branches with flower buds – or you’ll compromise the blooming stage later.
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Damp weather boosts the growth of microbes and mould where you’ve cut, while very high temperature stresses and dehydrates plants. Better to wait for a mild day – when it’s not too hot, raining or cold.
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Don’t over-prune thick, vigorous stems or leave too many thin, weak twigs behind.
Know how much to cut
Every species requires different pruning methods at different times. And while some require just a superficial tidying up, others benefit from being cut right back to encourage vigorous leaf growth and new shoots in spring.
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Encourage strong flowering shoots on clematis by removing old growth and cutting down to 10cm above the ground.
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With wisteria, cut back the longer stems to the second or third leaf buds, but leave any short side-shoots with clustered flower buds, unless damaged.
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Tidy up winter-flowering jasmine once the yellow flowers have faded. Trim by up to 5cm to a bud, or cut back more if there’s a lot of dead wood.
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Cut back buddleia, floribundas, hybrid teas, shrub and climbing roses – leaving them between 15cm–45cm tall, depending on their original size.
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Prune autumn-fruiting raspberry canes back to ground level. But for summer-fruiting varieties, just cut the tops off.
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Some tender evergreens require just a light trim. For older, overgrown shrubs such as viburnum and mahonia, cutting off up to a third should help rejuvenate them.
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And for plants such as bush roses, being pruned right down hard once a year keeps them compact.
