Wisteria Pruning
I love getting hold of a wisteria! Whether a young plant that requires some attention to train it to a beautiful structure or an old beast that has gotten out of control, I’ll be in my element.
A nicely pruned wisteria is a thing of beauty throughout the year: it will flower well in the early summer, have a second flush of flowers mid-summer, be covered in healthy
foliage and the structure will be quite sculptural in the winter.
A badly pruned wisteria will never satisfy: it won’t be floriferous, will send out excessive growth in the summer and look a mess in the winter.
I was given a project to renovate a wisteria on a big manor house a few years ago. It had only ever been trimmed with a hedge cutter as long as anyone could remember, was a complete mess and had hardly flowered for as long as anyone could remember.
- A complete tangle
- Loads of dead and rotting vegetation amongst the healthy limbs.
- I don’t like ladder too much but the Discovery made a great work platform.
- Starting to take shape.
- The finished project, taken at dusk.
- A couple of weeks later the wisteria flowered!
That was the first years work. I did explain to the client that to get the best from it the wisteria would require judicious pruning every year but I’m yet to revisit…