Slash and Burn

Pruning is a dark art.  Prior to this year I'd only ever pruned my buddleia and my clematis montana, both of which - as I think I've said previously - you could prune with a flame-thrower and they'd still come back.  In March this year I ventured into slightly murkier waters and pruned my clematises.  Only one of them died, so I considered myself to have done quite well.  Well enough...to prune the temperamental possible philadelphus! 

The temperamental possible philadephus is so-called a) because I once pruned it and traumatised it so badly that it refused to flower for the next three years and b) because due to a) I wasn't sure whether it actually was a philadelphus or something else entirely.  Anyway, after being left strictly alone for a long time it flowered this summer, and I became reasonably sure that it was, in fact, a philadelphus.

As well as the philadelphus, the viburnum and the weigela also needed serious attention.  Ahem!

My pruning style tends to be a bit slash-and-burn - once I get started I can't stop.  This is what I ended up with.

I reassured myself with the fact that I pruned my climbing rose almost down to the ground in March and it's now about three foot tall and has nine buds on it, plus one beautifully scented flower that had been hidden by the rampant weigela (or viburnum, I can never remember which is which).

I'm hoping that philadelphus will flower again next year - having read up on pruning I learnt that philadelphuses flower on old wood, and so you have to prune them after they've finished flowering, so that by the time a year has passed the new wood that you didn't prune last summer has become old wood which flowers.  That's the theory anyway - we shall see!  One branch had a couple of blossoms left on it, so I put them in my bud vase and took a photo in case I don't see any philadelphus flowers for another three years.

The one thing about rampantly overgrown foliage is that it hides all the weeds...now that the foliage is all gone I'll have to sort them out!  Then I can start working on getting a bit more colour in the flower border - it's a bit late for this year, but I do have a couple of things to plant out, and I can always put some bedding plants in if I get desparate. 

In other news, it was my Dad's birthday on Sunday.   Happy Birthday Dad!

King Edwards