Simon Eade says there’s little time to waste (Image: YouTube/WalkingTalkingGardeners)
The bleakest months of winter, when many trees and shrubs have shed their leaves, are the best time for gardeners to get a really good look at their branches and get a sense of the plant’s overall shape.
Gardening expert Simon Eade says there are several plants that do benefit from a judicious snip at this time of year.
He says pruning is a surprisingly controversial business and there is considerable disagreement among some experts when it comes to pruning – for example – walnut trees. Some gardeners say they should never be pruned at all.
Simon explains on his Walking Talking Gardeners YouTube channel, there are some garden favourites that everyone agrees should be left untouched right now: “Your stone fruits, which would be your your plums, damsons, gages, nectarines, apricots, cherries, ornamental cherries, all of the stone fruit plants.
“You don’t cut these at this time of year. It is entirely the wrong time period.”
Now is the time to remove unsightly or diseased branches from your apple trees (Image: Getty)
Read more: Gardener warns ‘never’ prune five types of plants in January
Read more: Plants you should never prune in January or risk no blooms in spring
Apples and pears
“The first two plants on the list are your apples and your pears,” Simon says. “These are the only fruit trees we’re going to be looking at cutting.
“The reason why you do it in January instead of say earlier on in the winter is because here in the UK, they can be at risk from a rather nasty disease known as fire blight.”
Fire blight is a contagious bacterial disease that can coo serious harm to apple and pear trees. It causes wilted blossoms, and blackened shoots that are characteristically bent into a twisted “shepherd’s crook” shape.
On warmer days, you can even see a bacterial discharge oozing from branches. It’s incurable and the only remedy is radical removal of the infected wood.
“You do see it around a lot,” Simon says. “It used to be a notifiable disease back in the day, but it’s pretty much everywhere now. There’s literally no point in notifying anybody about it.
“So, in order to avoid catching that rather nasty thing,” he concludes. “Cut your apples and pears in January.”
Now’s the best time to trim a hornbeam hedge (Image: Getty)Hornbeams
Carpinus betulus, the European or common hornbeam, should generally be trimmed back in August or September, Simon says.
“However,” he adds, “there is a second opportunity, which is now, in order to improve the density of your plant come the spring.
“So despite the most common time of August, September, you do have the second opportunity now in order to improve the look of your plants.”
If your hornbeam hedge has become too large, it can be cut back quite severely in wintertime, and it will regrow. Be sure to double-check that your ladder’s on a stable footing if you’re pruning the top of a hedge.
Many experts recommend leaving your walnuts alone (Image: Getty)Walnuts
One of the more controversial entries on Simon’s list is the walnut: “In general, it is not recommended to prune back or lop or remove branches from your walnut trees. That is the recommendation of most of the books.
“But if you really have to, then the Royal Horticultural Society recommend pruning your walnuts in midsummer to the beginning of the autumn.
“But it doesn’t end there, because many walnut growers, such as the Walnut Tree Company, also recommend a cut in mid winter. Don’t leave it to late winter next month. It’s only going to be in January.”
Simon explain that pruning walnut trees, especially in warmer weather, can cause sap to “bleed” heavily from the tree. For his part, he says he never cuts walnut trees at all. But if you do feel the need to trim you walnut tree, he says. “You’ve got a choice. You can go by the Royal Horticultural Society or you can go by the walnut tree growers.”
The increasingly popular Japanese maple shouldn’t be pruned after the end of January (Image: Getty)Maples
Another group of plants that are prone to bleeding their sap are the acers, or maples. While this is rarely fatal in itself, bleeding sap can temporarily weaken the tree, attract pests, or invite disease
For that reason, Simon stresses: “January is your last time for these.”
If you have one of these very popular trees in your garden, he adds: “The time to cut is now. Once this time has passed, it’s too late. You will have to wait until next year.”
Whether to prune your climbing roses is a tricky question (Image: Getty)Climbing roses
Simon’s final tip is another controversial one, he says: “I am going to put roses on the list only because the Royal Horticultural Society recommends that this is your last opportunity to cut your climbing roses, but I don’t really agree with it.”
He adds: “You certainly wouldn’t be cutting back your shrub roses. You certainly wouldn’t be cutting back your rambling roses.” Despite several experts suggesting that January is the best time to get climbing roses into shape, Simon’s preference is to hang on until March.
“But,” he concedes, “this is what the research says. This is what the RHS recommends. January is the last time for climbing roses.”
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