Wisteria needs harsh treatment says Mark Cox of Baytree Garden Centre in Weston

Wisteria is the focus of this week’s Out in the Garden column, which is written by Mark Cox of Baytree Garden Centre

Sadly for me, the speaker whom the gardening association chair had booked to go on before me at the last minute was unable to attend. Unfortunately the association’s secretary said that he could step in at the last minute and rescue the day!

Herbert Smith, whom I’m now convinced is leader of the terminally boring party, managed to talk for 90 minutes on why the Nikon 35mm SLR camera manufactured in 1976 at their main plant in Tokyo, was a far superior camera to that made in 1977 due to the design change made by Hiriako Nagimjima to one of the 5mm screws which fixed the bezel to the body of the camera.

After he had finished speaking, a short headcount was taken and first aid was given to those who needed reviving. Following a short break for tea and to allow for the bodies of those who couldn’t be saved to be carried from the village hall, it was my turn to speak.

I made my thanks to the organisers for inviting me along and I thanked everyone for attending before taking a deep breath and beginning with my talk.

I started with how to care for wisteria and discussed how back in February of this year I gave my wisterias their first prune of the year. This involved cutting back any new growth to about two or three buds. Well, the shoots I cut back have grown on and now need their second cut. I asked if anyone in the audience had any wisteria and I was pleasantly surprised that three or four hands went up which meant that at least some people were still awake.

I explained that you’d need to use a sharp pair of secateurs to cut the whippy growth back to about 30cm or 12 inches. Also look for any main stem growth that was growing where you didn’t want it to be and cut those back. Wisteria, whilst a beautiful plant to have in your garden, can soon grow out of control and become a bit of a thug. So they do need harsh treatment to keep them in check.

Once the pruning is done, it’s a good idea to give the plant a bit of a feed. You can buy a specialist feed but any left-over tomato feed will do just as well. When getting rid of the wisteria clippings make sure that any diseased growth goes into your incinerator rather than your compost bin.

I was in full flow now as I moved onto a few other tasks that would need tending to. I asked again if anyone had early flowering perennials in their gardens. About ten hands went up. At this time of the year you may find that they look a little tired and un-loved, their foliage has become untidy and has turned brown. Well you can give them a bit of a boost by cutting them back close to the ground. In some cases you might even produce a new flush of flowers but certainly you’ll get a fresh growth of healthy green foliage. Hardy Geraniums, Nepetas and Alchemilla are perfect examples of early flowering perennials that benefit from cutting back in early August.

Remember, when you’ve finished, give them a good feed of Growmore and within a couple of weeks you’ll start to see the signs of new growth.

If like me you like just pottering about in the garden then keep dead heading your flowers to produce more blooms and make sure that you water your plants regularly during warm and dry spells.

As you can imagine with a talk this short, the remaining audience members gave me a thunderous applause, as there was still time for last order in the village pub.