I bought a tiny lavender but now it's ballooned – the bees dictate when I prune it & there's a golden rule I never break

Scottish Sun

07-07-2025

Including how often you should be watering your lilac shrubs
FLOWER POWER I bought a tiny lavender but now it's ballooned – the bees dictate when I prune it & there's a golden rule I never break
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NOTHING quite matches the relaxing scent of lavender during a warm spring and summer evening.
Although it is a quintessential product of Provence, the sturdy shrub has been a gardeners' favourite all over the world and has been cultivated since Ancient Rome.
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One green-fingered Brit shared tips that saw her lavender thrive in the dry soil
Credit: FACEBOOK/Gardening On A Budget Official
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Pruning is also another essential when it comes to maintaining your garden - but there's also a specific method the avid gardener follows
Credit: FACEBOOK/Gardening On A Budget Official
This beautiful yet low-maintenance shrub is often available in a range of stores where you can snap it up for a bargain price.
But how to look after it to ensure your lavender is the biggest on the street? And is it possible to make it thrive even when you have dry soil?
According to one green-fingered Brit, it is - and there's one golden rule all gardeners should follow when planting the lilac shrub.
Offering a helping hand to fellow gardeners, Angela Wynn took to Facebook to share some of her top tips which have helped her lavender balloon from a teeny plant to a mega shrub.
She told the members of the Gardening On A Budget Official page: ''Every year we have posts asking how to look after lavender, so I'd like to introduce you to mine.
''I planted them more years ago than I care to remember, as tiny little plants in to very poor, dry soil.''
While many may assume the more hydration, the better the results will be, the green-fingered Brit revealed that it's the total opposite - and you should, in fact, keep the watering to a minimum.
She said: ''I rarely water them in summer, never water them any other time.
''I prune them after the bees stop visiting, no specific date, no specified month, just the weekend of the first week no bees visit,'' she went on.
Pruning is also another essential when it comes to maintaining your garden - but there's also a specific method the avid gardener follows.
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''Pruning consists of roughly skimming over the plant with my hedge cutter!''
Angela - who is one of the 453k members of the popular page - also has a golden rule she swears by.
''My only 'rule', don't cut into the woody bit, and there you go!'' she wrote in the post.
''Each year I'm rewarded with this beautiful display,'' she said, sharing a snap of her adorable dog for ''scale''.
Top gardening trends of 2025
Gardening experts at Barnsdale Gardens has shared the top gardening trends of 2025.
Matrix planting
It seems that a top planting trend for this year is going to be Matrix Planting.
In essence, planting in groups or blocks to give an effect of being wild whilst actually being carefully managed.
Selection of the plants is essential, to give year-round interest either with flowers, seed heads or frosted/snowy spent flower heads. Some recommend using plants that seed around, but this could make managing your matrix planting harder to keep under control.
Chrysanthemum comeback
I hope that the humble Chrysanthemum makes as much of a comeback this year as Dahlias have over recent years, because the simple single flowered types, such as 'Innocence' and 'Cottage Apricot' would be spectacular within a matrix scheme.
The hardy varieties are so easy to grow in a sunny spot and give such a valuable burst of late summer and autumn colour that would lift any dull- looking border.
Blended borders
For some time now we have been promoting the growing of veg within ornamental borders and I think this could really take off this year.
The choice of ornamental-looking varieties available in seed catalogues is phenomenal and, if managed correctly, visitors to your garden will not even realise that you have veg growing!
Must-have tool
My secret is out. I discovered the Hori Hori a couple of years ago and now it seems so is everyone else.
It is such a well-made, adaptable tool that can be used as a trowel or weeding tool in the garden that and everyone I speak to who have used it absolutely would not now be without it. Enough said!
'Same! Mine thrive on neglect'
Since being shared online, the post has clearly impressed many, amassing over 200 likes and dozens of comments.
One person said: ''Brilliant post, I do despair of all the posts that say this has to be done by this time and only prune this much, I do the same, I leave flowers for the insects and cut right back to last molecule of green.''
Someone else chimed in: ''Beautiful. My neighbour has the most beautiful hedge of lavender between his driveway and and his neighbours.
''It's absolutely teeming with pollinators and its looked lovely for over 15 years and he does absolutely nothing to it.
''He doesn't even trim it back. And yet I look after mine, dead head it, trim it back and mines now dead.
''I don't seem to be able to grow and look after Lavender at all.''
A third shared their go-to approach, writing: ''Mine is huge this year. I was worried as I had hardly any bees but they've arrived this week.
''Like you I give it a haircut when the bees have gone.
''I've planted it in my front garden this year too including some white French Lavender as I am having to make it deer proof and they don't like it.''