Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => General Gardening => Topic started by: RubyRed on January 20, 2019, 19:20
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It flowers on last year's growth and it was best to trim after flowering last August. Trouble is i forgot and now I don't know if to leave it this year or lightly trim in February. Will it hurt to leave it this year. I don't want to over prune because we are hopefully getting bees and don't want to lose any chance of flowers. Thanks
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Edited, sorry I just saw the globosa bit, my advice was for regular buddleia.
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I've usually hacked my B. globosa in early spring, not realising I should have done it after flowering! Though I can't remember what impact on flowering it had …
If flowers are your aim this year, then I'd leave it as it is unless it's too big for its spot. Mine has been left unpruned for several years with no ill effects, other than having to be attacked with a proper saw in places when I eventually did prune it :ohmy:
RHS info on the plant: https://www.rhs.org.uk/Plants/2453/Buddleja-globosa/Details
RHS pruning info (group 2): https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=197
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Thanks Yorker will do. Though looking at it I'm confused as to why I can't hard prune as there are breaks in the stem with new shoots all the way down like an ordinary buddlea. :unsure:
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It won't harm it to prune now Ruby, but you will get less flowers. If you cut the lead buds off with the ends of the branches, the ones lower will take over and you may well get a second flowering later in the year to make up for it.
The general rule of thumb for anything flowering before the summer solstice is that they flower on old wood, so you prune once they have flowered. This gives the shrub time to make new wood that will flower the following year.
With anything flowering after that, they usually flower on new wood. You prune over winter or early spring, so you get a spurt of new woody growth for flowers.
With most shrubs, if you prune at the 'wrong' time of year the plant survives just fine. You just may not see many flowers. If you have an overgrown triffid that is taking over, that might not matter so much to you anyway :)