Unshearing Sheared Evergreens

Tired of constant pruning or need a change from those green gumdrops, hockey pucks and meatballs?  With a bit of time and patience you can convert these back to their natural beauty.

Start the unshearing process in late winter or early spring.  You’ll need a good pair of bypass pruners, loppers and a pruning saw.  And don’t forget the gloves and safety glasses for your protection.

Use renewal pruning to convert multi-stemmed shrubs like forsythia and red twig dogwood back to their natural habit.  Remove a few of the biggest oldest stems to ground level.  Repeat each year.

Multi branched plants are a bit trickier.  Remove a few of the thickest clumps of twiggy growth throughout the sheared plant.  Or remove several of the finer smaller twigs from the twiggy masses.  Or use a combination.  Make cuts back to the main stem.  Repeat yearly until the plant regains its natural appearance.

A bit more information:  Some shrubs tolerate shearing better than others.  When shearing a hedge of planting, keep the base of the plant wider than the top.  This allows light to reach all parts of the plant, preventing naked ankle syndrome; shrubs with no leaves at the bottom and all the greenery at the top of the planting.

Tags

prune evergreens forsythia red-twig-dogwood

Related

Article

Best Pruning Tool for the Job

Article

Pruning a Yew Hedge

Article

Deer Resistant Evergreen for Creating Privacy and Windbreak

Article

The Best Time to Prune Oak Trees

Article

Water Evergreens and All Landscapes Plants Up Until the Ground Freezes

Article

Pruning Fairy Rose

Article

Pruning Nearly Wild Shrub Rose

Article

What to Remove When Pruning Roses

Article

When to Prune Roses

• « Previous
• 1
• 2
• ...
• 11
• 12
• 13
• 14
• 15
• 16
• 17
• 18
• 19
• Next »