Shrub Pruning

Continuing Education Hours: Claim 2.5 hours if you watch the videos, do the reading and complete the practice exercises.

Pruning encompasses the spirit of horticulture. It is both a science and an art. Often, we talk about how to prune trees and the importance of good pruning for those long-lived members of the landscape. However, in this module, the shrubs are taking over! Shrubs are all around us and serve many purposes in the landscape, from beauty to natural fences to food and more.

This Plants Plus focuses on the practices, timing, and species-specific tips for pruning shrubs. We will be specifically focusing on ornamental shrubs, but many of the pruning practices and techniques are applicable to all shrubs.

You’ll learn to:

Identify different types of shrub pruning techniques: thinning (renewal), rejuvenation, heading back, and shearing.
Identify the correct time to prune spring-flowering shrubs, summer-flowering shrubs, hydrangeas, and types of evergreens.
Create a pruning plan for an ornamental shrub.

PRUNING SHRUBS

Watch these videos to learn about pruning ornamental shrubs:

Presented by Lisa Johnson, Horticulture Educator, Extension Dane County
Videos are ~66 minutes long in total. There are eight videos in a playlist and and you can watch them in smaller chunks. You should watch them in order. Videos are in a playlist so will advance from one to the next automatically. You can pause at any time during a video or between videos by using the pause at the bottom of the video screen. You can also move between videos in the playlist using the playlist icon at the top of the screen.

Resource alert: The Shrub Pruning Chart contains a list of deciduous shrubs and the best time/technique to use to prune them. Shrubs are listed alphabetically by scientific name. This contains the deciduous shrubs mentioned in the video plus more. You can download a copy. This resource is helpful when doing the practice activities.

READ

Read through these two Extension publications to reinforce what you just heard about pruning.

Pruning Deciduous Shrubs, UW-Madison Division of Extension
Pruning Evergreens, UW-Madison Division of Extension

PRACTICE

Now it’s time to practice! Below are three practice activities focusing on pruning shrubs. When you’ve finished these three activities you will complete a two-question module completion survey. You only need to turn in the survey to show you completed the module.

What Pruning Technique is Best?

Instructions: Practice your pruning techniques! Each slide has 2-3 questions. After you click your answer, it takes about two seconds to automatically advance to the next question on the slide. To advance to the next slide, click the tiny black arrow on the bottom of the box. The yellow lines on the pictures indicate plant tissue removed by pruning.

What Time of Year Do I Prune?

Instructions: Timing is everything, especially for pruning. These slides illustrate general guidelines and the best time to prune different types of shrubs. Some slides have “flip cards” to test your knowledge. Follow the directions to “turn” the card and see the answer. To advance the slides, click the tiny black arrow on the bottom of the box. If you would like to have a copy of the slides for a visual reference, they are available for download below.

When Should I Prune? downloadable slides from the activity

Create a Pruning Plan

This module is packed with information about pruning, but don’t worry. You don’t have to memorize everything for every shrub. Instead, in this final activity, focus on one shrub that you’re growing or want to grow and apply what you’ve learned to create a simple pruning plan.

Instructions: Download the worksheet. We recommend printing it and working with pencil and paper. If you don’t have a printer, no problem! You can just write your answers on any sheet of paper. You only need to do this for one shrub to complete the module. You do not need to submit this.

Shrub Pruning Worksheet

Module Completion Survey

Instructions: Complete the survey to tell us you finished the module.

Report your continuing education hours in the Online Reporting System.