Gardening tips for June/July: Pruning wisteria

published 15 June 2009

How to prune wisteria

Having finished its spring flowering, wisteria makes rampant growth now with long, whippy shoots; they need pruning back at midsummer before they become overbearingly tangled.

Cut back the trailing, wiry stems now, to leave four or five leaf-joints remaining on each stem. (Wisterias need twice-yearly pruning: the next time will be in midwinter, when you will be hard-pruning to get good flowering spurs; alas, it cannot all be done at once right now.)

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