Time Period
Pruning small branches can be done at any time of year. Large branches, with more than 5-10% of the plant's crown, can be pruned either during dormancy in winter, or, for species where winter frost can harm a recently-pruned plant, in mid summer just after flowering. Autumn should be avoided, as the spores of disease and decay fungi are abundant at this time of year.
Some woody plants that tend to bleed profusely from cuts, such as maples, or which callous over slowly, such as magnolias, are better pruned in summer or at the onset of dormancy instead. Woody plants that flower early in the season, on spurs that form on wood that has matured the year before, such as apples, should be pruned right after flowering, as later pruning will sacrifice flowers the following season. Forsythia, azaleas and lilacs all fall into this category.
Read more about this topic: Pruning
Famous quotes containing the words time and/or period:
“Now the hungry lion roars,
And the wolf behowls the moon;
Whilst the heavy ploughman snores,
All with weary task fordone.
Now the wasted brands do glow,
Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud,
Puts the wretch that lies in woe
In remembrance of a shroud.
Now it is the time of night,
That the graves, all gaping wide,
Every one lets forth his sprite,
In the church-way paths to glide:”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Intellectual life is international. Only a period of discouragement, an age that has given up on itself, that wants to “preserve,” that has been driven onto the defensive, can be intellectually nationalist. Such a period is essentially “conservative.” A person who has progress in his heart is international.”
—Robert Musil (1880–1942)