Pruning Season in Costa Blanca: What to Prune and When

"When is pruning season?" is probably the question we hear most often. The short answer is that there is no single pruning season: every plant has its moment, and on the Costa Blanca that calendar is somewhat different from the one in gardening manuals written for colder climates. Here winters are mild, frosts on the coast are rare and the summer is long, dry and very hot. That changes when it makes sense to prune and, above all, when it doesn't.

In this article we summarise the pruning calendar we follow in the gardens we maintain between Calpe and Murcia, grouped by type of plant and by time of year.

The general rule: prune according to when the plant flowers and when it rests

Almost the entire calendar follows from two principles:

• Deciduous plants are pruned while dormant, at the end of winter, when they have no leaves and the sap is still. The structure is easy to see and the plant heals as spring growth starts.
• Flowering shrubs are pruned right after flowering. If you prune a spring-flowering shrub in winter, you cut off the shoots that were going to bloom and it will hardly flower that year.

Our climate adds one more rule: avoid hard pruning in the middle of summer. A canopy thinned out all at once in July leaves branches and trunks exposed to a sun that scorches the bark, and forces the plant to regrow precisely when it has the least water available.

Pruning calendar at a glance

Autumn: tidying up and maintenance trims

With the first rains and the end of the heat, autumn is a good time to leave the garden in order before winter: remove dry, broken or crossing branches, give hedges of pittosporum, privet or photinia their last trim, and prune oleanders and other shrubs that have flowered during the summer.

What you should not do is hard-prune tropical or cold-sensitive species such as bougainvillea, hibiscus or lantana: the tender regrowth triggered by pruning would reach winter without hardening off. Their main pruning is left for spring.

Winter: the season for fruit trees and deciduous plants

Between December and February we concentrate on the plants that lose their leaves:

• Deciduous fruit trees (peach, plum, apricot, apple, pomegranate, fig): formative and fruiting pruning in full dormancy, preferably towards the end of winter in inland areas with a risk of frost.
• Roses: the main pruning is done in late January or February, leaving each stem with a few outward-facing buds.
• Grapevines: in January and February, before they start to "bleed" sap.
• Deciduous ornamental trees such as mulberries, melias or plane trees: thinning and structural corrections. On large trees this work already falls under high pruning.

Spring: palms, citrus, olive trees and flowering plants

Once the risk of cold has passed, between late February and April, it is the turn of the evergreen trees most typical of our gardens:

• Palms: the best window is February to April, before the heat, when pruning wounds heal quickly and attract the red palm weevil less. We explain it in detail in When to prune palm trees in Costa Blanca?.
• Citrus (lemon, orange, mandarin, kumquat): light pruning after harvest, removing suckers, inner branches and dead wood so that light and air reach the canopy. Citrus trees do not need hard pruning; overdoing it reduces the crop.
• Olive trees: thinning the canopy to open it to the sun, removing suckers from the base and the trunk. On ornamental olives this is also the time to keep their shape.
• Bougainvillea, hibiscus and lantana: formative pruning and size control as new growth starts.
• Spring-flowering shrubs: pruned as soon as they finish flowering, never before.

Spring is also the breeding season for many birds that nest in hedges and trees. Before a major trim, check that there are no occupied nests and, if there are, wait.

Summer: green pruning and gentle trims

In summer we only do green pruning: pinching out overly vigorous shoots, removing suckers and basal regrowth, keeping hedge lines tidy and doing the summer pruning of wisteria, which is shortened to encourage flowering the following year. These are small cuts that the plant closes quickly and that do not throw it off balance.

Hard pruning, pollarding and cutting thick branches are left for another time of year. If a tree poses a risk (a broken branch, a palm with dry fronds hanging over a walkway), that is dealt with at any time of year.

The pruning mistakes we see most often

• Topping trees to reduce their size: it causes massive, weak regrowth and leaves the tree less stable and more exposed to fungi.
• Removing more than a quarter of the canopy in one go. If a lot needs to come off, it is done over two or three seasons.
• Cutting flush with the trunk or leaving long stubs, instead of cutting just outside the branch collar.
• "Skinning" palms and leaving only a few fronds: it weakens the palm and gains nothing.
• Pruning with dirty or blunt tools, which tear the wood and spread diseases between plants. We cover this in our guide to pruning tool maintenance.

Need help with pruning your garden?

Every garden is different: a plot with fruit trees inland in Alicante is not the same as a seaside garden in Jávea or an urbanisation with hedges and palms in Torrevieja. At Jardines Costa Blanca we plan each client's pruning throughout the year so that every plant is pruned at the right time. Ask for a free quote for shrub and hedge pruning, palm tree pruning, high pruning or a complete garden maintenance plan.