Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with bushes

What can I say... I love growing things!

Mastercheddaar — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 08:57:54 -0800

Spring time gardening care filter. Need a little advice. With warming weather coming I thought it would be a good idea to prepare everything now. I have a green thumb and I pretty much can grow anything so general maintenance is a snap. The only problem is I need some help with the more complicated stuff.
I have planted the following: a Victory Garden! (many years running), Raspberry bushes (1 year old), Blueberry bushes(1 year old), 2 peach trees (2 years old), a nectarine tree( 3 years old), 2 cherry trees(2 years old), a buckeye tree(1 year old), a dogwood tree(1 year old), and lastly a fig tree(1 year old).

For the bushes: I have read on several different sites plenty of different pruning methods (cut the cranes, don't cut the canes, let them grow out, give them something to grow on, etc.) Which ones work? Which ones don't?

For the peach/nectarine: I had peach scab on them bad last year. What can I spray them with to prevent that this year?

For the Cherries: Japanese beetles nearly killed one of them last year. Any hints on how to prevent that from happening again? I heard an herb "Rue" helps keep them away. Anyone ever hear of that?

For the victory garden: I have done this for a while and have the regular veggies down pat. Any unique ones anyone can think of? I got a small patch of about 10-15 feet square I can use.

AND lastly I order some hop rhizomes to plant along my fence. Anyone have any hints for those as well?

Sorry for the huge question but any suggestions are welcome.

Sharpening my pruning katana as we speak

TungstenChef — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 13:14:31 -0800

Help this young grasshopper become a tree pruning ninja. The good news is that the previous owner of our house had the foresight to plant a lot of cool trees and shrubs 20 years ago (primarily ficus, oleander, and acacia). The bad news is that he was terrible at pruning and we seem to have inherited every conceivable problem...tree branches growing against the house, ugly dead wood in the center, wild overgrown tangles, and lack of leaves in many shaded areas to name a few.

'Tis the season for pruning in Arizona and I want to learn how to be really good at it. As in, Japanese garden good. Does anyone have any recommendations for really good books on the subject? Or other ways to learn how to do it right? I can find some basic info on the web but I want to go far more in depth.

Trimming Hedges

crazy finger — Sat, 28 May 2005 08:36:57 -0800

There are a few evergreen bushes in front of my parent's home and they are overgrown. How do I trim them back? These bushes/hedges are evergreen and they are getting way too big. They're overgrowing the sidewalks/yard/each other and I want to cut them back a little.

My father tried to cut them back a few years ago so he did an experiment and trimmed one back and it never filled back out... but he did it on the shady side of the bush where it meets the house and my theory is that this prevented the grow back. If I trim the entire bush back a lot, will it grow back before winter comes and kills it?