Pruning advice

[BlueBlueSea]

I have just moved house into a house with a lovely garden, well two months ago. The lady who lived here before me was here 20+ years and really loved her garden.

Unfortunalty when I moved in the house had been empty for over 6 months. The garden had got a bit overgrown. We have got that in hand but I am finding that the pruning she would have done at the end of last summer onwards has not been done.

The jasmine has gone nuts and is everywhere, but is not flowering. The mock orange, did flower but not as thickly as I would have expected, I can see that there are lots of dead stems from last year still in the midst of it. Am I ok to cut it right back almost to the ground, will it recover? The same with the jasmine?

I also have a yellow flowering shrub, with slightly spikey soft leaves, it has stopped flowering, can I cut that back too?

Everything has grown into each other and there are ferns and jasmine mixed up with holly, passion flower and the yellow flower.

I thought that as long as something has finished flowering it is ok to prune?

I have not had a garden to look after for a few years, so am a little rusty. I welcome any advice.

[Mitzimaybe]

Hi, I'm in almost the same situation as you and have found the RHS website quite useful, although it doesn't answer everything.

Mock orange:
www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=197 (and links at the bottom to other types.)

Is your yellow flowering shrub a hypericum?

Renovation pruning:
www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=194

HTH.

[Mitzimaybe]

What type of jasmine? Is it the winter jasmine? If so, then it should be hard pruned after flowering (early spring.) Now might still be OK, but it might not flower very well next winter. Basically, it will flower on the growth it makes and ripens this summer, so if it doesn't have chance to do that growing and ripening, it won't have many flowers.

[BlueBlueSea]

Thank you those links are useful. I think I will prune it well now, see how it does next summer, then think again.

I do not think the yellow shrub is a hypericum, it is on long stems that all come from the ground and the leaves are almost nettle like. My mother would now, I have to wait for her to come and see me, could be months though.

The Jasmine is a summer flowering one, as far as I can tell. There is no sign of flowering and it is all long woody stems with very little greenery.

[aircooled]

Is the yellow one Kerria? I treat mine almost like a raspberry, cutting the flowered 'canes' down so the new ones grow up. I think it's better to remove the old, woody stems from the philadelphus rather than cut the whole lot down - the younger stems will then have room to grow and possibly flower next year.

[BlueBlueSea]

aircooled Yes it is a Kerria, it has spread quite a lot. I will thin it out now and possibly divide it in the early autumn as RHS suggest.

Thank you for your advice.