Pruning in Melbourne
The right cut at the right time of year, for more flowers, more fruit and healthier, better-shaped plants.
Pruning makes a bigger difference to how a garden looks and performs than almost any other job, and it's one of the easiest to get wrong. Cut a hydrangea back too hard and you can lose next summer's flowers; leave a rose unpruned and it grows tall, woody and prone to disease.
We time each job to the plant: roses and deciduous shrubs in winter, spring-flowering shrubs straight after they finish, and natives lightly as their flowers fade. Our work is garden-scale pruning. Large trees, and any work on significant or protected trees, need a qualified arborist and sometimes a council permit, and we'll let you know if a job needs one.
What's included
- Winter pruning of roses, including climbers and standards
- Pruning fruit trees at the right time for each type
- Pruning deciduous shrubs while they're dormant
- Tidying spring-flowering shrubs once they finish flowering
- Light tip pruning of natives like grevillea, westringia and correa
- Removing dead, diseased and crossing branches, then clearing the prunings
When to prune in Melbourne
Winter, from June to August, is the main pruning season in Melbourne. Roses, deciduous shrubs, grapevines and fruit trees like apples and pears are dormant, so their structure is easy to see and they recover quickly when growth starts in spring. Hydrangeas are best cut back towards the end of winter.
Apricots and cherries are the main exception. They're better pruned in late summer or early autumn, after harvest and in dry weather, because winter cuts leave them open to fungal diseases like silver leaf. Spring-flowering shrubs such as azaleas, camellias and lilacs should be pruned straight after flowering, and most natives respond best to a light trim as their flowers fade.
Pruning near you
Available across all of our service areas, including:
Pruning: your questions answered
How do you prune a rose bush?
Most roses are pruned in winter, usually in July, while they're dormant. Cutting back to an outward-facing bud and opening up the centre of the bush improves airflow, which helps reduce black spot and powdery mildew. Climbing roses are trained along their supports rather than cut back hard.
Can you prune large trees?
We do garden-scale pruning of shrubs, small trees and fruit trees. Large trees, work at height and anything involving a significant or protected tree need a qualified arborist, and many Melbourne councils, including Boroondara, have local laws that require a permit to remove or heavily prune protected trees. We'll let you know if your job falls into that category.
Why didn't my hydrangea flower this year?
The most common cause is pruning too hard or at the wrong time. Mophead and lacecap hydrangeas flower on stems that grew the previous season, so in late winter only the stems that flowered should be cut back, to the first pair of fat buds. Cutting every stem to the ground removes the coming season's flowers.
Is it OK to prune native plants?
Yes, most natives benefit from it. A light trim after flowering keeps grevilleas, westringias and correas compact and bushy. Avoid cutting back into old, leafless wood, because many natives won't reshoot from it.
Often booked together
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