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Pruning eucalyptus

I wondered if you could give me some advice regarding how to approach pruning my eucalyptus tree.

Eucalyptus responds very well to pruning and it’s not too fussy how you do it. The best time of year to prune is in late winter into early spring.
How you prune it depends on what you want. For a Eucalyptus that grows like a shrub with multi-stems rather than a tree-like shape, you can cut a young tree right back to around 50cm from ground level and then cut back hard every year. This will give you those nice young shoots which are used by florists.
If you need to prune because the tree is getting too tall, you can cut the main stem back to the height you want and it will develop side shoots quite easily.
If you want a nice tall tree, you can raise the crown by cutting off the side shoots all the way up the stem until you have a clean main stem with growth at the top.
If you need to prune because it’s getting a bit messy, simply cut away the branches that bother you and the tree won’t mind a bit.
When you prune eucalyptus, it develops lovely young side shoots with leaves that are more silvery than the mature leaves so its worth while doing every now and then to get the benefit of the new growth.
The RHS gives good advice on pruning eucalyptus
This question was answered by the editor

Cutting back a cypress hedge

I planted 10 Leylandii last year side by side, and was wondering when I should trim the top of them, to let them grow out the way.. they were planted when they were about 3 - 4 feet and they are now about 6 - 7 feet..

Trim them now. You don’t really want them getting taller than 7 feet otherwise it’ll cause you a headache cutting them.
Find the main stem in the middle and cut this to around a foot below the height you want the hedge to be eventually. This will stop the trees growing up the way and you’ll start to get soft growth from the side branches which will eventually thicken up across the top of the hedge making it easier for you to cut. Trim the soft growth on the sides very lightly being careful not to cut into the wood - this is assuming you want to get a squareish hedge. When you cut the sides, cut at a slight angle, leaving them wider at the bottom so that the light can get to the leaves at the bottom and you shouldn’t get browning at the foot of the hedge.
They don’t regenerate from old wood so don’t cut into the brown wood anywhere else except on the main stem if you have to - only cut into green growth. The recommended maximum amount you can trim off a lleylandii hedge is around 6 inches. After that you must trim every year to keep it at the required height and do it in early summer so the new soft growth has time to harden up before winter.
This question was answered by the editor


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