Abelias & Spireas, Cont...
I also remember when I was first learning to prune. I was
going over one of the parks with a senior horticulturist. When
we got to the abelias I said, "But I suppose these are okay to
shear?" "NO!" was his adamant reply.
Meanwhile, in one of the downtown parks, "'I ain't lyin' James"
took electric hedge shears to the abelias, turning them all
into perfectly smooth buns and globes. The office workers
loved it. Which brings me to the most common mistake
people make when pruning --- shearing.
THE MOST COMMON MISTAKE. Species-wise, abelia fits the
criteria for good plants to shear: small leaves, evergreen, and
tough enough to take shearing. Spirea, on the other hand,
soon looks like heck, developing dead bits, losing its flowers,
and, in the winter, one can easily spy the rat's nests of
leaves and debris that collect as the result of shearing.
But shearing should be avoided even on abelias or on anything,
for that matter, that is not planted as a formal hedge or
topiary. This is true despite the fact that most people
seem to like it. I remember, back in those old Park
Department days, driving by one of those absurdly poodleballed
yards. My boss said, "Disgusting, sheared to within an
inch of their lives!" I thought to myself, "What a party pooper.
I think it looks pretty interesting. They seem healthy
to me." Twenty years later I'm married to the guy and
running a crusade to end bad pruning.
I guess I think of the love of sheared shrubbery as an early
stage of horticultural awareness, like when you were a little
girl and liked pink unicorns. It's a phase to be moved
through rapidly on the road to horticultural sophistication.
But the main reason I hate sheared shrubbery is because of what
happens next. Every place a cut is made, three shoots, wild
and straight, leap up from the cut end. This is especially so
on abelias.
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