I bought quite a few cheap, very small heathers from B&Q early summer.
These have all flourished and are now coming into flower (my old leggy
established heathers all flowered in spring).

Do I prune them back after flowering or wait until autumn or perhaps
even spring next year?

thanks for any advice.

On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 18:06:00 +0100, Chris Hogg wrote:

On Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:02:07 +0200, bob wrote:

I bought quite a few cheap, very small heathers from B&Q early summer.
These have all flourished and are now coming into flower (my old leggy
established heathers all flowered in spring).

Do I prune them back after flowering or wait until autumn or perhaps
even spring next year?

thanks for any advice.

Heathers are usually pruned after flowering. If you don't, new growth
starts from the top of the flowering stem and over several
cycles/years the plant eventually gets leggy. Giving them a haircut to
cut off the old flowers keeps them compact.

Thanks - I'm still stuck in beginners' corner. Some time ago I was
offered a rule of thumb from a 'professional' gardener: "prune after
flowering if it flowers before the end of june - otherwise wait until
the following spring" - hence my confusion here.

Rhodies are doing well, by the way. Thanks for your earlier help with
those.