Get happy with shrubs!

The start of a new year is the time for resolutions, and the garden is the perfect place to begin as it is clear of leaves so you can see the trees and shrubs properly.

January is the ideal time to prune as we can see shrubs really well and they are dormant.

The ones to avoid cutting are the plums and cherries. These are prone to get the silver leaf fungus, which can attack through the wounded branches and twigs.

It is best to leave them alone at this time of year and make a note to do any pruning in June when they are growing fast and are more likely to withstand fungus.

Certain more tender shrubs should also be left until the spring, just in case we get a bad spell of weather which would cut them back.

This means that shrubs such as hydrangeas, abutilon, ceanothus and cistus should be left alone. Others can be studied now that the leaves are gone.

Have they become too big for their places, or are they tumbling over paths and blocking people as they try to walk round the garden?

With all the rain we had this year the shrubs have grown enormously - it would be surprising if some have not outgrown their space.

The first thing to note is any dead portions - they should be cut cleanly back to an outward facing bud. Then look at the shape of the shrub.

They can quickly become too long and lanky, and will repay a pruning by growing more tightly and making a better bush next spring.

Bushes grown for their foliage will react to being cut back by producing many more stems with foliage on them. They look better, too.

A tight small bush of photinia with masses of red growth is much better than a large, lanky shrub with a middle that is bare. This applies to flowering shrubs too.

There will be more flowers on a weigelia or a deutzia if it has been pruned properly, allowing the blossoms more room in the sunlight than if it is left to roam as it wants to.

Shrubs which flower on the current season's growth, such as amorpha, really need to be pruned every year, right back to the ground, to let them make the growth needed before the time for flowers.

In fact, most shrubs which flower at the end of the year, such as hibiscus or coriaria, need to be pruned back or they get far too big and the winter is the time to do this successfully.

By Pat Edwards