By Krys Stefansky

Get out your pruners and head for your azaleas. Now, at the end of their bloom, it’s time to shape them.

Note the word “shape.“ Not “shear“ or “clip“ or “buzz saw like a maniac into a cube or ball.“

Please. We’re going to gently shape the azaleas to prune back their leggy branches like these gangly sprouts here:

You‘ll need a pair of sharp pruning shears and a bag or bin to collect cuttings. You’re welcome to put on your straw hat. 

First, stand back and look at your shrub. Most azaleas have a naturally mounded shape. We want to prune back anything that has grown above or beyond that mound.

So, with one hand, grab a long sprout, reach down into the shrub and make a clean cut with the shears.

It‘s important to make the cut down, inside the shrub so that new growth will start from there - down low where you can‘t immediately see it - rather than right at the mounded top, where any new growth will pop right back up within weeks and immediately disrupt the mounded shape that is the goal.

Same thing with a twig that has, say, a spray of new growth at its tip. Reach down into the shrub and snip it off there.

Easy!

If you have big-leafed azaleas like a Mrs. G. G. Gerbing, Formosa or this pink George L. Taber -  one of my favorites - check it for an unsightly skirt or long branches that have grown at ground level and make the shrub wider at the bottom than you want. Prune those ground-level branches the same way - reaching under the bottom of the shrub to clip so the cuts aren’t visible.

There. All done.

Now let‘s take a moment to commiserate with the members of the Garden Club of Virginia and their now-cancelled Historic Garden Week, which was supposed to start yesterday, April 18. All those pretty gardens now not on the public tour.

Ugh. Not the end of the world, certainly, in light of all the damage the coronavirus has done to the entire planet but a disappointment for gardeners in our state and for all of our local garden club members. Hope they and their families come through this virus safely and that their statewide beautification efforts are appreciated. 

I read my Historic Garden Week booklet the other night from cover to cover and saw that, on top of everything, this is the Garden Club of Virginia‘s Centennial year. Such a bad coincidence. It’s also the 87th year of the garden tour in our state, cancelled only once before, during WWII.

Good grief. Makes me want to go chop weeds with a very sharp hoe.

But, look ahead and mark your calendars now with the tour dates for 2021: April 17 - 24 and for 2022: April 23-30.

I do have a little good news. Those ladies - always thinking! - are putting photos of the gardens they had planned to let us tour this week on their facebook and Instagram pages. To see them, go to Historic Garden Week in Virginia on facebook. This virtual tour will be up from April 18-25. On Instagram, search for Historic Garden Week in VA. Yesterday, they posted an aerial tour of Historic Kenmore in Fredericksburg. A very cool look at the house and garden!

Send them a donation via information at vagardenweek.org, if you can. This cancelled garden tour is a huge financial loss for them.

So, prune your azaleas, enjoy the Garden Club of Virginia‘s Virtual Tour every day this week. And stay well.