August 2025

Time your pruning correctly

It’s important to time your shrub pruning properly, especially with showy specimens like Hydrangea paniculata. When this hydrangea blooms, it’s an awesome show with white panicles covering the shrub. But you have to make sure the small, developing flowers don’t go missing when they’re still inconspicuous.

I witnessed one such accidental pruning earlier this summer. Dudes were talking and snipping shoots that looked out of shape. But they failed to notice the small developing flowers. By the time one of the owners noticed the deed, it was too late.

Oh well!

Now, luckily the lady was good about it. “It happens” attitude is nice to have but as a landscape manager I want my crews well trained. The lesson here is that Hydrangea paniculata should be pruned in fall, winter or early spring before flowers start developing. Once you see flowers, the shrub is off limits. Leave it alone and enjoy the show from mid-summer on.

When I examined the shrub, the developing flowers were still green and not easy to spot so the workers need to know the shrub and correct pruning time. That takes time and repetition.

I got to see the shrub in late July and, from a distance, it looked ok. But up close, you can see the incorrect cuts up top where the growth spikes would have attracted landscapers bent on controlling every shrub.

So, it’s not a complete disaster but the show is slightly diminished, which is unfortunate.

Conclusion

Be careful when you prune! Carefully consider your targets and ask yourself why you’re pruning. When you see a few spikes on top of your shrub, relax, and examine the shrub for flowers. This should be easy to do in your own garden because you know your shrubs well.

If you do mess up, then learn from it and do better in the following season. It probably isn’t a huge disaster.

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House for sale

As a landscaper running my own side-hustle operation, I get a lot of requests for help with houses going on the market. And very few of these houses have gardens in great shape. Usually, I see lawns that are weak and cut too short, with overgrown shrubs and trees; and you see large trophy weeds everywhere.

And after twenty-six seasons in landscape maintenance you would think that I have seen it all. Wrong! There are always surprises waiting for me.

A bamboo lawn?

It started out like a normal operation. The lawn in front of the house looked long and weedy, with sweetgum tree suckers poking out from Azaleas and the open spots had weeds. Nothing I can’t handle.

Then I dropped down a set of stairs to the back lawn and I was stunned! The lawn was covered in bamboo shoots too thick to mow over. So I had to charge the owner for removing the bamboo and then mowing.

And as I was bent over the bamboo shoots, snipping them off, I kept thinking about the poor new owners. How do you even get rid of bamboo which easily crossed over from the neighbour all the way to the patio. That’s a nightmare.

I was supposed to do bi-weekly cuts while the house was on the market. But since the bamboo grows fast, I suggested weekly mows so I could just mow down the bamboo shoots. Otherwise she’d have to pay for the extra removal.

Renters did it?

Now, it’s easy to pick on renters for failing to maintain the landscaping. However, in this case it’s the owners we have to blame. The neighbours live in Asia and rent out their house. Unfortunately, somebody planted bamboo along the fence and it obviously escaped. It crossed the lawn and reached my client’s patio. So be careful when you plant bamboo: pick varieties that don’t spread.

I have no idea what the new owners will do. They have to dig up the bamboo from their lawn and somehow block it from invading again. That doesn’t sound like fun and I won’t be doing it; even if it could put my kids through college.

Ruthless tree removal

Sadly, some poorly placed trees must be removed before they get too big. This is often the case with invaders like one alder tree I removed today. I was mowing near a patio when I noticed an alder tree growing in front of a window; it was also crowding out a hydrangea shrub. Alarm bells went off in my head.

Now, I love trees and I think we should be planting more of them but this alder didn’t have a future in its current spot. All you have to do is look into the nearby wild zone to see mature alder specimens. Left alone, this alder would eventually reach over the roof.

Knock, knock

Since you can’t eliminate the possibility of homeowner planting, I did what you should always do. I knocked on the door so I could speak to the owner. The last thing you want to do is uproot a tree donated by long-deceased grandpa.

And after a few questions it became obvious that this alder was a wild invader and it wasn’t especially loved. It was time to get a sharp hand saw.

Voted off the island

Every time I remove trees or seedlings I feel bad about it, but poorly placed trees can’t be left to mature and cause problems. So I grabbed my sharp Fiskars hand saw and I took the alder tree down.

It’s best to take it down in sections, starting at the top. Since this was a small tree, I took cut it down by half. One day we’ll go back and dig up the root base. I suspect we’ll see suckers sprouting out of the base soon. Alders are fast-growing, colonizers.

Conclusion

If you discover seedlings or small trees invading inappropriate spaces, take action. I absolutely detest removing healthy trees but in these cases there is no choice. It’s better to do it early on when there is little green waste generated and chainsaws aren’t required.

Remove the invading tree and plant something else. The bed I worked in has a hydrangea shrub which should benefit from more light. And there is plenty of space for other plants.