In a previous blog I showed how I had neglected to hack back the jasmine on our fence which was now a huge tangle. The perennials underneath were struggling to get some light. I thought I’d made a mistake in not reducing its size in early spring.
However, as I sit in the garden this morning the whole garden is filled with the scent of the jasmine flowers and at night it is even stronger. It is flowering on the tips of wispy shoots so I realise that in previous years my mistake has been to cut off all the new growth in early spring and thus cut off all the flowering shoots. Not very clever.
At last this year, because of not getting round to pruning it, I have the scent of jasmine from a jasmine plant. Success. The books tell me to prune it to reduce size just after flowering in late summer or early autumn.
Some early flowers will then be on the previous year’s growth but the main flush will be on the tips of the new growth made over the winter and early spring. Those are the flowers I am enjoying now.
Moral of this tale – read about when to prune before pruning.
Fabulous jasmine scent from a tangled climber
Glad you are enjoying the scent at last! The smell of jasmine on a hot summer evening is difficult to beat. To my mind only the Night Scented Phlox comes close. To be honest I have never had trouble from jasmine pruning wise. I just hack it back in early spring and then tidy it up a bit by cutting back to a pair of buds. I haven’t fund it to be too fussy. I must have been lucky I guess!
I will remember to prune it in early spring but seeing how much of tangled mess it is would you not cut it right back after flowering this year? If I don’t, won’t it just get bigger and bigger?