In the Northwest, March is one of those months that reminds me to go with the flow. There can be heat, rain, hail or snow in an unpredictable buffet of weather. It is a moment in time where everything is taking a breath in preparation for a spring explosion.
It is also the time of year when I give some of my most difficult pruning advice. Patience. Yep, dreaded patience. Unless you have cane shrubs to thin or shrub rejuvenation projects now is the sliver of season when those of us in Portland Oregon wait. It might feel like winter with the trees looking bare but it’s not quite that. It might feel like spring with daffodils popping up but for the trees its not quite there. You will have your own sliver of season wherever your live.
Patience is a little easier to achieve if I can focus on whats just around the corner. Soon we will be watching the little leaf and flower buds plump up and burst out in all of their vibrant and often fuzzy drama. Usually they are not as boisterous as their annual garden friends but up close they are intricate and detailed. A complicated origami masterpiece folded into a tiny space waiting for its moment. If we stop to smell the roses we should definitely stop to observe the leaf buds and marvel at their emerging delicacy.
First the entire profile of a tree will start to change color, looking a little purple or lime green as the buds swell and show more color. If we blink we might miss the day they start to unfurl but usually they won’t do it all at once and we can catch those ephemeral moments just like we wait for the cherry blossoms to bloom.
Patience might not seem like a good tip but when you are pruning with design intent the health of your tree and its reaction to pruning is more important than pruning trees as a spring cleaning to-do item. Save your energy and time for preparing your perennials, seed starting shenanigans or whatever else is on your spring check list. All too soon the trees will be ready for us.
Going ons
APA Tree Talk
On March 30th at 10:00am pacific time modern topiary artist Darren Lerigo will join the APA for a discussion about topiary. He is on the Council of the European Boxwood and Topiary Society (who I recommend in my course Pruning Decisions with a Plan) and creates topiary all over the UK, New York and Hong Kong. He will introduce us to modern topiary as he practices it and explore with the APA how aesthetic pruning and topiary converge and diverge. Register with the APA HERE. I will see you there.
Conference
Save the date for the North America Japanese Garden Association 7th International Japanese Garden conference October 15-18, 2025 in St. Louis, MO. It will be hosted by the Missouri Botanic Garden. I have been to each conference since the first at the Denver Botanic garden in 2012. Each one has been full of unique presentations, beautiful gardens, and amazing people who are generous with their knowledge and enthusiasm. Click here for more information.
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