Pruning: A Gardener’s Ultimate Guide

Expert comment provided by horticultural expert Jack Stooks, former Head Gardener to King Charles at Highgrove House Garden, who’s currently working with Savoo.

It can feel pretty counterintuitive to spend months – even years – perfecting your rosebush, only to lop its branches off.

Even Monty Don admits that pruning can cause “some anxiety”. It can be hard to feel sure you’re cutting at the right time, in the right place, on the right plant, to prevent unwanted dieback.

Thankfully Jack Stooks, former gardener to King Charles, has shared his ultimate pruning tips with us.

“By cutting things down, you’re always trying to encourage growth to come from the very base of the plant,” he explained.

“Doing that keeps the plant healthy because you’re using plant material that’s new year after year, rather than holding on to old dead wood that’s hard and doesn’t properly flower.”

“With pruning, we always go with diseased, damaged and dying,” Stooks told us.

“If you’re going to prune a rose, for instance, you’ll inspect the rose and see what’s dead. If there are any branches that are dead within it, cut those out.”

And if any parts are diseased, you can cut them off. Once that’s gone, you can see what needs more work.

“Generally speaking, most plants you would take off about one quarter maximum, but you could probably take off a third of the growth. With roses, you can take away more.”

You might also want to remove crossover or weaker branches. “You want to have really sharp secateurs or a really nice sharp saw to use for the bigger branches,” Stooks said.

Once the pruning’s done, fertilise and feed the plants.

“You can dig the manure in, or use some blood, fish and bone for the plant, or get fertilisers. It’s good practice to prune everything, then feed the plants afterwards to maintain good growth.”

Generally, Stooks said, you want to do the job before spring and after winter.

“You can start pruning things from December into the early months of the year… you don’t want to be pruning when things are trying to grow.”

For example, pruning forsythia in summer will mean it simply won’t flower, he explained.

It’s also illegal to deliberately harm a bird’s nest in the UK, which is why some experts advise against cutting back hedges from March to September.

“There are some plants that are good for a late winter prune, like wisteria. You can also do a late summer prune, like with an apple tree,” Stooks added.

“Once the apples have finished on the branches, you can pick them and do a prune of the plant, which can be done in the late summer, but in the later winter, I’d give them a better prune.”

Ornamental pruning can also “be done during the growing season”.

Stooks said he always prunes plants at different levels (e.g. not to one solid length).

“Some people will get a trimmer and they’ll go into their garden and shape their shrubs. They can shape it into a ball shape and leave it at that. You very often see gardens where the shrubs look like they’re trying to grow but aren’t given the opportunity.

“I don’t necessarily agree with this method, as I do think a natural look always looks better,” he said.

Instead, he recommends a more freehand approach, with “secateurs or a little saw, or loppers if you need, and try and open the shrub up a little bit… That’s the best way of pruning because you’re getting air and light into the plant”.

“You can usually tell by the growth that a plant has put on, so it is worth inspecting it,” Stooks told us.

“With roses, you can sometimes tell by the height of the plant. You might buy some roses, then they end up growing to around five feet… That’s the same for any shrub.

“You might have had a beautiful view of a field from your garden, but then three shrubs have taken over and are way too big for that space, so taking control of that would be the way forward.”