![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.theguidetogaygardening.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/P5080134.jpg\")
<\/a>Weigelia’s need a heavy handed chop<\/p><\/div>\n
There comes a time in a garden’s life when things need a little more work than a simple spruce-up. Whilst you might be used to overhauling your herbaceous beds every year, planting out and then digging up annuals, and spreading vast amounts of muck on your vegetable patch, it’s the larger plants that after often forgotten. Shrubs and trees make up the skeleton of most gardens, a backdrop upon which other plants are offset against. We all take the time to cut back flowering shrubs on a consistent basis to ensure that we get blooms year after year. But, sometimes, standing back and taking a careful look at your garden is important.<\/p>\n
I, myself, have often overlooked garden jobs that should’ve been done far earlier. I have a very thin south facing garden; thus, one side gets a lot of sun whilst the other, because of neighbouring trees and fences, spends a lot of time in the shade. Not that I mind this as it’s provided the perfect environment to plant my fern garden<\/a> and enjoy some shade loving plants such as heucheras and vinca. But, a huge weigelia had got rather unruly over the years, and though I’d regularly cut out the non-variegated stems and pruned back after flowering, several successive years had seen it grow into a monster. Thus, one day, I realised that my partial shade patch was now full shade. However, in managing to see past the plethora of beautiful foliage and bushiness, I realised that a heavy cut back would suddenly unveil a whole new garden area to work with. The weigelia survived, though on a smaller scale, and I’d found new planting territory to expand.<\/p>\n My example is only on a small scale, but the same could be said of trees too. Beautiful towering tree specimens are a tremendous addition to the garden but like all things, they need to be contained a little. Unruly trees don’t only look bad and take up a lot of space, but they can have a heightened risk of damage too. You only have to look at a birch that’s been allowed to tower, unobstructed, into the sky to realise that a storm could rip a branch away and cause devastation to both tree and surroundings.<\/p>\n I also realise that in many cases, you may be beyond pained to have a tree chopped down. In most situations, as a tree lover, I would always try and suit a garden setting to a resident tree. In a lot of landscaping you can used professional surgeons, such as Greencut Horticulture<\/a>, to tidy and reshape a tree so that it fits the location. However, in some instances, actually removing a tree might be better for other surrounding trees and plants.<\/p>\n A garden is constantly evolving, and we’re used to that change. But the backbone of a garden, the evergreens, shrubs and trees that provide form and contrast can quickly be forgotten. They’re overlooked and in the same way that you might see a grey hair one day and wake up the next to find a full head of salt and pepper, newly planted specimens quickly being huge creations that weigh heavy on a garden’s landscaping. However, by being a little brutal and using a clear sense of vision, a quick chop will unveil all manner of new opportunities.<\/p>\n