The Pruning School

What a great day ... pruning class with Peter Deahl (the expert, left) at Tudor Place in DC's Georgetown section.  Deahl runs classes in northern Virginia & other locations throughout the year, and you simply can't get better instruction. Check out ThePruningSchool -- it's packed with information and advice. For all the books I've read over the years on pruning, there's nothing like having an expert show you how to do it and then practicing those same techniques yourself.  First lesson and most important:  DO NOT CUT THE TOPS OFF TREES -- you'll kill them.  Just a few other tips we picked up during the course of the day:  Do not prune plants when they're putting on new leaves in spring or when shedding leaves in fall. Don't shear shrubs over & over -- you also need to thin them from inside to keep them healthy.  Do not flush-cut   trees or shrubs -- or you are inviting decay and eventual death.  Here's a huge boxwood at Tudor Place (right) BEFORE Deahl's crew got to it. They took it down by about five feet (left) in no more than about 15 minutues. When you buy a new boxwood or other plant from the nursery, Deahl recommends leaving it alone for a year or two before you touch it with pruners. And don't forget -- if you're in the DC area, time your visit to coincide with one of Deahl's classes -- you'll never, ever regret it.

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