Pruning Dogwoods

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I decided last weekend that my collection of Cornus (Dogwood) shrubs needed tidying up.I pruned them all very hard in the Spring and during the Summer they put on a lot of new growth, but much of it was very higgledy-piggledy, growing in all sorts of silly directions (mostly downwards!), and the border was looking a right mess.

I’ll show you a couple of close-ups of the “Before” situation.  Exhibit ‘A’…

Exhibit ‘B’…

A lot of the droopy, downward-growing shoots had touched the soil and begun to root. Presumably this is one of the Dogwood’s normal methods of propagation.

Ready-rooted cuttings!

Using my heavy-duty loppers for the big bits and my secateurs for the smaller ones, I removed all the stray branches, leaving only the best of the upward-pointing ones. This meant removing about two thirds of everything! This is Exhibit ‘A’ in its “After” state. Much neater, I think you’ll agree.

Likewise, Exhibit ‘B’ after its operation:

I think that what this will do is allow the shrubs to put most of their energy into a smaller number of better branches. This should hopefully pay dividends in the Spring when new growth begins to appear once more.

Only a very small number of the cuttings I planted in the Spring had taken root – which is just as well I suppose, since I do already have plenty of Dogwoods!

Spring-planted cutting now rooted

 My Cornus Alba “Kesselringii” – the one with the very dark-coloured stems – got a bit of a tidy-up too, but it is already quite a nice shape, with lots of upward-pointing stems.

So now the shrub border is looking a lot neater. You won’t be able to make this out in my photo, but there are actually six different Dogwood varieties in that bed, and another elsewhere.

I have the following varieties:-
1. Cornus Alba “Kesselringii”  – very dark, almost black, stems, bronzey-green leaves
2. Cornus Alba “Aurea” – red stems, yellowy-green leaves (Exhibit ‘B’ above)
3. Cornus Alba ”Gouchaultii” – red stems, variegated green-and-cream leaves
4. Cornus Sericea “Cardinal” – red, orange and yellow stems, plain green leaves
5. Cornus Alba unknown – greenish-yellow stems, green leaves (Exhibit ‘A’ above)
6 Cornus Alba unknown (nicknamed “Milton Keynesii”) – red stems, green leaves
7. Cornus Sanguinea “Midwinter Fire” – red/orange/yellow stems, golden leaves

You might think that caring for Dogwoods seems like a lot of trouble, but I disagree: a few hours of pruning each year, and you are rewarded with THIS:-

“Midwinter Fire” in November

and THIS:-

“Milton Keynesii” (a nickname only, please note)

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