Everyone homeowner needs their shrubs pruned, but many are intimidated by the job. Pruning is one of the most important cultural practices for maintaining woody plants, including ornamental trees and shrubs, fruits and nuts. It involves both art and science: art in making the pruning cuts properly, and science in knowing how and when to prune for maximum benefits.

There are numerous reasons for pruning. Sometimes you want to train or direct the growth of plants into a particular form or a specified space, like a formal hedge. Or you may want to prune mature plants to control their size and shape, as in the case of fruit trees that are pruned low to the ground to aid picking or hedge plants pruned at a particular height. For fruiting plants, pruning plays an important role in improving overall fruit quality, primarily by increasing light penetration into the tree.

Unfortunately, many people approach pruning with a great deal of apprehension. Others view pruning as a chore and give little forethought to technique as they hastily do the job. Proper pruning requires a basic understanding of how plants respond to various pruning cuts. Use the knowledge and skills you have learned in your environmental horticulture class and develop your own business pruning shrubs.

Getting Started

Market your service by explaining to your customers how properly pruning t will help ensure high quality blooms and vegetative growth. Pruning strengthens branching structures, helps prevent limb breakage, and ensures that all limbs receive sunlight, which promotes blooms and fruit.

It is very important to plan a marketing and public relations strategy with this enterprise. Think about how you are going to get the word out to your community about your services. Options could include:

Designing an Ad and advertising it in the newspaper

Designing a sign and flyers and posting them in strategic locations throughout the community and school

Local Community television station

Remember that word of mouth is very important, after each job that you finish ask the homeowner if you can add them to your client referral list.

Develop a portfolio of your work and price list of your services to use when talking to customers.

Skills Needed:

There are three types of pruning you will need to become proficient in:

1.Heading Back: means cutting or shortening a branch or shoot, cutting the branch just above a bud. This encourages lateral branching.

2.Thinning out: removes unwanted or rubbing branches, or those with weak branch angles, by cutting the entire branch or shoot back to a lateral branch or the main trunk.

3. Renewal pruning: Harsh pruning of overgrown plant materials.

Materials/Tools Needed:

Chain Saw                                                       Extension Pruning Saw

Lopping Shears                                               Hand Bypass Shear

Rope                                                                Gloves

Hedge Shear                                                     Truck & Location to haul limbs to

To keep all pruning tools in good shape, sharpen and oil their blades at the end of each season. When sharpening loppers, hedge shears and scissor-action hand shears, sharpen only the outside surfaces of the blades so the inside surfaces remain flat and slide smoothly against one another. It is best to have pruning saws sharpened by a professional. Oil blades by wiping them with a cloth saturated in household oil, and treat wooden handles with linseed oil.

Pruning Time

Because flowering ornamentals form their flower buds at different times of year, pruning times must be adjusted accordingly. Many spring-flowering plants such as azalea, dogwood, forsythia, redbud and rhododendron set flower buds in the fall, so pruning during the fall or winter months eliminates or decreases their spring flower display. Plants that typically flower during the summer form flower buds on new growth and can be pruned during the winter with no effect on their flowering. Examples of this type of plant are crape myrtle and abelia.

As a general rule, plants that flower before May should be pruned after they bloom while those that flower after May are considered summer-flowering and can be pruned just prior to spring growth. One exception to this rule is the oakleaf hydrangea, a summer-flowering shrub that forms flower beds the previous season. Another exception is late-flowering azalea cultivars which bloom during May, June or even July. Prune both the oakleaf hydrangea and the azalea cultivars after they bloom.

Ornamental plants that are not grown for their showy flowers can be pruned during the late winter, spring or summer months. Avoid pruning during the fall or early winter because it may encourage tender new growth that is not sufficiently hardened to resist the winter cold.

Written by: Teri Hamlin

Books:

Dirr, Michael A.  DIRR'S HARDY TREES AND SHRUBS: AN ILLUSTRATED ENCYCLOPEDIA.  Portland, OR: Timber Press, 1997

Dirr, Michael A.  MANUAL OF WOODY LANDSCAPE PLANTS: THEIR IDENTIFICATION, ORNAMENTAL CHARACTERISTICS, CULTURE, PROPAGATION AND USES.  Champaign, IL: Stipes Publishing, 1998.

Websites:

Georgia Extension Service: Pruning

Andersen Horticultural Library.  PLANT INFORMATION ONLINE.  Chanhassen, MN:

Minnesota Landscape Arboretum, 1998,1999.

Sierra Home.  GARDENING PLANT ENCYCLOPEDIA, 9/30/99.

CD-ROMs

Dirr, Michael, A.  MICHAEL A. DIRR'S PHOTO-LIBRARY OF WOODY LANDSCAPE PLANTS ON CD-ROM.  Locust Valley, NY: Plant America, 2000.

Horticopia, Inc. HORTICOPIA: TREES, SHRUBS AND GROUNDCOVERS. Purcellville, VA: Horticopia, Inc. 2000.

Phillips, Roger and Martyn Rix.  PERFECT PLANTS.  London: Macmillan Interactive 1999