Summer Pruning Guide: Keep Your Landscape Thriving All Season Long

As the summer sun blazes and your landscape bursts into full bloom, it's the perfect time to give your plants the mid-season care they need. Strategic summer pruning keeps your shrubs, trees, and perennials healthy, beautiful, and under control, without sacrificing next year’s blooms.

Why Prune in Summer?

Summer pruning isn’t about heavy cuts, it’s about smart maintenance. Pruning during the growing season:

• Shapes and controls growth before it gets too wild.

• Improves air circulation to prevent disease.

• Encourages more flowers or fruit on certain plants.

• Removes dead, damaged, or crossing branches that sap energy.

What to Prune in Summer

Not everything should be pruned in summer, but here are a few safe bets:

1. Spring-Flowering Shrubs
Think lilacs, forsythia, and viburnum: these bloom on old wood, so summer is your last chance to shape them before next year’s buds form.

2. Spent Perennials
Deadheading (removing spent flowers) keeps your garden looking tidy and may even encourage a second bloom.

3. Fast-Growing Hedges
Boxwood, privet, and yew can all benefit from light shaping to maintain structure.

4. Fruit Trees
Light summer pruning can improve air flow and help shape trees. Just avoid heavy cuts, which are better left for dormant season.

5. Suckers and Water Sprouts
These fast-growing, weak shoots drain energy: remove them cleanly from the base.

What Not to Prune

Avoid pruning:

• Maples, birches, and walnuts: they can "bleed" sap if pruned in summer.

• Stressed or drought-stricken plants: pruning can add unnecessary strain.

• Fall-blooming shrubs like butterfly bush or Russian sage: wait until late winter or early spring.

Pro Tips from Villani Landshapers

• Use clean, sharp tools to prevent the spread of disease.

• Don’t prune more than 1/3 of a plant at a time.

• Water deeply after pruning to reduce stress.

• Always cut at a slight angle just above a leaf node or branch junction.