Is it true that the lilac is growing better if you break off the branches?

There is an opinion among the people that breaking the flowering branches of lilacs is useful for a bush. We decided to check if this is so. 

The myth that you need to trim the lilac for more magnificent flowering for the next year. base. When the lilac blooms, the seeds remain at the site of the inflorescences - and that’s exactly the bush so that the shrub does not spend strength on their maturation, but would take them for the next year. But this must be done after flowering - and neatly, a clean secateur, in no case breaking up the branches. 

Director of the Botanical Garden of Moscow State University "Pharmaceutical Garden" Alec Retuyum claimsthat there is nothing wrong with collecting a flowering bouquet of lilacs. If you act wisely, this will not harm the plant in any way. How to cut a bouquet correctly? Specialists Recommend Do this strictly until 10 in the morning, when the plant has the largest amount of moisture. In order not to harm the bush, you can cut no more than a third of inflorescences. You need to do this only clean, preferably even a sterile sharp secateur.

Irina Okuneva, senior researcher at the Main Botanical Garden named after N.V. Tsitsina RAS, curator of the lilac collection, He thinksthat the breakdown of branches is the worst that can be done with the bush. Even the immoderate cutting of inflorescences into bouquets can damage the plant and worsen flowering next year. If you regularly break the branches, the lilac can completely wagize and die. The fact is that it is impossible to do this carefully: the “torn wounds” of the sodaral bark in which the infection or disputes of harmful mushrooms may fall will still remain. This Curses To the diseases of the lilac, worsening flowering, inflorescences become smaller and faded - and it is almost impossible to cure the bush.

Besides, Mark Biologists, on branches with inflorescences are also located the kidneys that are responsible for the flowering of the next year. If you break them, in this place the shrub will not bloom soon.

Another problem is that the bushes that plant in the parks and on the streets of cities are cut in a special way so that the lilac has shape and looks beautiful. If you break off her branches, this will not only immediately worsen the appearance of the shrub, but also It will complicate Figure pruning in the future. On the branch that was broken, sleeping buds can wake up, which will be escaped in the wrong direction where gardeners need, which means that the bush will lose their shape.

The people really believe that there is nothing wrong with breaking the lilac bushes, supposedly it even benefits her - next year she will bloom even more magnificent. Nevertheless, there are no discussions among specialists on this subject. All of them are unanimous: it is impossible to break lilac branches. In addition, to do this in public places where flowering shrubs should delight the eyes of thousands past passing people, not only harmful to the shrub, but also illegal (in Moscow threatens fine), and just ugly. What is really useful for lilacs is pruning, but it should be carried out with a clean sharp tool, after the bush bakes, and in a certain way - so that the buds responsible for flowering next year are not affected. In public places, gardeners are engaged in this who know how to do this. And before cutting the lilac in your garden area, it is better to read about the features of pruning, and not break the branches with bare hands.

Not true

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

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2. How to grow lilac
3. Collection of lilacs of the Botanical Garden of Moscow State University named after MV Lomonosov