Pruning Wisteria
Tips for Pruning Wisteria
Pruning Wisteria properly is important if you do not want to ruin your beautiful plant. With Wisteria being such a popular landscaping vine plant, there are many people who need to know how to prune Wisteria without damaging it. You can keep your Wisteria looking beautiful, but still manageable if you pay close attention to pruning it on a regular basis.
Although it is not absolutely necessary that you prune these vines, by pruning Wisteria you can keep them from growing and climbing on everything that is within its path. Another advantage of pruning Wisteria is that the flowers will be much more visible, and not covered up by growth. To keep you Wisteria looking as beautiful as possible you will want to trim it about twice a year. This vine plant should be trimmed once in the summer and once in the winter.
When pruning Wisteria in the summer, you will want to wait until the flowers are faded. During the summer pruning you will want to trim back the current years growth to about six inches. In addition to this you will also want to remove any shoots that are not part of the main frame of the plant. If you like the seedpods, you can leave some of these for looks, but remember that your main purpose is to bring the plant down to the frame that it is growing on. This will help the Wisteria to appear more elegant and graceful when it is in bloom.
In winter when pruning Wisteria you can cut away and shoots that have grown since the last time you pruned. You will want to cut them down to about three to five buds. Due to the fact that the framework of the Wisteria is exposed during the winter it will be easier to see any shoots that you missed when you trimmed during the summer; now would be the time to trim back these missed shoots.
Pruning Wisteria for new plants is important if you want to train the vines. These vines can be shaped to grow as a shrub, or you can train them to grow up a building or in a lattice, as well as an arbor. With the Wisteria you should only need one plant to cover whatever structure you want it to grow on.
You will want a sturdy structure to begin training your Wisteria on; some types of structures are easier than others. With the arbor you will have to have some patience as this does take some planning to be successful.
To start with you will need to let a few shoots entwine loosely around the post as they are growing. When shoots are young you will need to secure them to the post with wire. Secure to vines as they grow with gardening twine; they should be tied loosely so that they are not putting too much stress on the structure as they mature.
When your vines reach the top of the structure it will be time to train them to grow out to cover the rest of the structure. To do this it is necessary for pruning wisteria tips; this helps the vines to grow shoots to the sides where it will grow out in that direction. As the vines are growing across the top of the structure you can remove the ties that have been used to train them.
There is nothing quite as lovely is having flowering vines growing across structures and buildings, and Wisteria are among the most beautiful. Pruning Wisteria can keep them beautiful, as well as manageable.