Hi All, first post.
I caught the fever in late summer this year (just a few weeks ago) and of course immediately acquired several armfuls of nursery stock to practice on. Some of it was enormously cheap (including two planters of lantana for $3 each on the discount shelf at Lowes, each containing multiple individual plants), some I spent a few more bucks on (like a very nice 3 or 4 year-old azalea I got on sale for $25 at a smaller nursery.) Overall, I have barberry, juniper, mugo pine, evergreen azalea, spruce (I know, I know), euonymus, potentilla, and pieris* as outdoor species, and lantana, hibiscus, and citrus to try to bring indoors. (I'm in Chicago -- Zone 5 or 6 depending on who you ask).
(*When the frost comes I'll probably look for a friend with an unheated garage or porch to winter this guy for me).
I've already wired the junipers and one of the barberry (badly!) For the others I haven't done much more than clear away down to the root crown, and done a basic cleaning (removed dead material, thinned out the branches to open the interior, done some light shape pruning (except for the mugo, which I understand should not be pinched until new spring growth).
What else can I do this late in the season that won't set them back or kill them? I'd like to do a bunch of wiring over the long weekend. Does it make sense to wire a tree that hasn't been heavily pruned? Are some of these OK to prune down severely this late in the year? (Roughly 45 days from first frost).
Thanks!
I caught the fever in late summer this year (just a few weeks ago) and of course immediately acquired several armfuls of nursery stock to practice on. Some of it was enormously cheap (including two planters of lantana for $3 each on the discount shelf at Lowes, each containing multiple individual plants), some I spent a few more bucks on (like a very nice 3 or 4 year-old azalea I got on sale for $25 at a smaller nursery.) Overall, I have barberry, juniper, mugo pine, evergreen azalea, spruce (I know, I know), euonymus, potentilla, and pieris* as outdoor species, and lantana, hibiscus, and citrus to try to bring indoors. (I'm in Chicago -- Zone 5 or 6 depending on who you ask).
(*When the frost comes I'll probably look for a friend with an unheated garage or porch to winter this guy for me).
I've already wired the junipers and one of the barberry (badly!) For the others I haven't done much more than clear away down to the root crown, and done a basic cleaning (removed dead material, thinned out the branches to open the interior, done some light shape pruning (except for the mugo, which I understand should not be pinched until new spring growth).
What else can I do this late in the season that won't set them back or kill them? I'd like to do a bunch of wiring over the long weekend. Does it make sense to wire a tree that hasn't been heavily pruned? Are some of these OK to prune down severely this late in the year? (Roughly 45 days from first frost).
Thanks!