Natalie’s Garden Blog June 2025

Winter Pruning – Creative and Rewarding Gardening

“Time is an amazing enigma in which seeds that were planted can turn into a vibrant garden if properly pruned” — Alyssa Milano 

Winter is a great time to prune – especially your roses

Gardening is both an art and a science, and pruning is one of the best ways to express your creativity. If you’ve ever hesitated to pick up the secateurs, this month we’re starting with the perfect winter candidate: roses.

Roses – heritage, hybrid tea, ramblers, climbers, miniatures, standards, floribunda... what’s your favourite?

Winter is all about roses – it’s the ideal time to plant or prune roses in New Zealand. It’s all ‘coming up roses’! Most rose plants sold now are about two years old and come either bare-rooted or potted. Bare-rooted roses are ready to plant now, while potted roses (available from September onwards) can be planted throughout the year. Just remember to keep them well-watered during their first summer.

New Zealand is home to world-class rose breeders and there’s an ever-evolving selection of stunning varieties. Every season there are new releases and 2025 is no exception.  Many modern roses offer repeat flowering, incredible scents, and improved disease resistance – meaning less spraying and healthier gardens. Older varieties tend to be more susceptible to pests and diseases.

Yes, roses can be prickly customers – but good garden gloves, a little care and the joy of picking fresh blooms for a vase more than make up for it!

Roses prefer a sunny, sheltered spot with free-draining soil. I tend to look for the very best sheltered and sunny spots in my garden where roses will be happiest. I also like to plant rose plants throughout the garden. They complement and work really well with other plants. Don’t forget feed your roses generously with a lime and dolomite mix, and a balanced fertiliser like Nitrophoska and Nitro Blue.

Above: Loving Memory – a strong, disease resistant and prolific flowering rose

Tips for pruning roses

Pruning shapes your rose bush, improves health and encourages vigorous growth and flowering. Roses are dormant in winter, and June and July are good months to prune.

Good pruning will:

• shape and control height

• remove dead and diseased branches

• improve airflow and light

• cut branches to an outward facing bud, but an inward facing bud also works if your bush will have a better shape

• eliminate weak or spindly stems.

Always use sharp, clean pruners and wear good-quality gardening gloves.

June surveys

There are a couple of interesting citizen science surveys this month looking for your vote. So make yourself comfortable on the sofa when our next wintry spell strikes and vote.

The first one is the New Zealand Garden Bird Survey:

Saturday 28 June – Sunday 6 July 2025

The survey has been led by Landcare Research since 2007 and is one of its kind. It tracks our bird populations over time. To date there have been over 44,000 surveys of gardens and parks by individuals, schools and community groups.

👉 Visit www.gardenbirdsurvey.nz to learn more, and join in.

Votes are also open for Tree of the Year until 30 June at www.treeoftheyear.co.nz 

This year, the Wellington region has a finalist: Greytown’s massive 40m high historic gum tree. Its origin dates back to 1856 when Samuel Oates stopped for a break in Greytown with a wheelbarrow of seedlings, and someone made off with three of them. One ended up in the churchyard of St Luke’s – and still stands there today.

Last year the ‘walking tree’ of Karamea gained worldwide attention.

The winner will be announced on 5 July.

Winter flowers catching my eye this month

Purple Cattelia and yellow Ballerina orchids - (a real show stopper) – brightening up winter’s muted colours.

Camellia flowers add much needed colour to the winter garden 

It’s time to divide and plant strawberries

Summer may feel like it’s a wee way away but now’s a good time to rejuvenate your strawberry patch. Is your strawberry patch looking a little like mine – scraggly and over-crowded? Are there too many runners? The idea is to look to have a mix of one-, two- and

three-year-old plants at any one time in your strawberry patch. Achieve this by rotating out the older plants, replacing them with rooted runners and cutting off any dead leaves. You’ll thank yourself come Christmas!

These healthy strawberry plants are ‘ripe’ for dividing up

This month's gardening gems

• Protect plants that are frost tender with white frost cloth, newspaper, cardboard... (citrus, luculia, Impatiens, orchids, banana plants, hibiscus). Cover before sunset and uncover in the morning to let in air and light.

• Don’t prune or fertilise any frost damaged plants.

• Don’t overlook plants that love the cooler weather and in winter will provide colour when everything else is dormant – Hellebores, Camellia, Peonies, Daphne, Dogwoods. Add them to your garden for winter colour.

• Plant new roses and prune existing ones.

• Harvest citrus fruit.

• Don’t overwater houseplants. 

Thanks for reading June’s garden blog.  It’s all about the art of pruning this month - especially roses. The same principles apply to fruit trees and ornamentals too, so sharpen those secateurs, put on your gloves, and enjoy the winter garden workout!

Natalie Quirke

Dip Hort, Dip Hort Mgt, NDH