How to Prune Oleander

Hi this Yolanda Vanveen and in this segment I'm going to talk about how to prune Oleander. Now Oleander is a beautiful evergreen shrub. It has really beautiful soft green foliage and gorgeous flowers in reds and whites and pinks and yellows. It's just a beautiful addition to your garden. But it grows very well and it's just much like a rhododendron or Azalea. If you just leave it wild it will get kind of wild with Medusa like branches. So there's some easy ways that you can trim it to keep it a little more in control. So the best time to trim your oleander is in September or October, cause it's done blooming over the summer. It's getting ready for winter and then that way it will have a nice growth for the next year. Now the best place to cut them is right where the three leaves meet. Because as you notice when it grows up they'll be three leaves. And at that middle point you want to trim it back. And you don't want to trim it back no more then one third the height of the plant. And by just evening it out and trimming it back you'll encourage new growth and even more blooms for the next year. You always want to remove the suckers from the bottom of the plant too because they'll just make it really wild looking and so you just want to leave the main branches. And remember oleander is very poisonous, so you want to wear gloves and a long sleeve shirt because you can get little cuts from the plant and it can eventually get infected. Because it is poisonous, you got to be a little careful with it. And you never want to burn your oleander because it's highly toxic when it's burnt. So you want to be really careful and make sure and throw away any parts of the plants once they've been trimmed. So oleander the flowers smell so incredible and it's really a beautiful plant for your garden.