Berberis - Will it survive?

Hello

I'm new here and sorry to say not very knowledgeable about gardening and growing, so am hoping for some advice.

I have a berberis (I think Darwinii... it is green all year round... sorry if that isn't the right term... I am picking up what I have read online) which has been heavily pruned by the gardener. It used to be a nice full bush, and I only ever used to trim it around to keep it in check. Now all we are left with is as per the photos.

To me (as a non-expert) the poor thing looks beyond redemption now and will need to be taken down. There doesn't seem to be enough scope for new growth for it to recover, given that the inner branches which as far as I know, have never had leaves on, are now exposed.

Am I right in my thinking, or is there hope that this will eventually grow back?

Thanks for your help!

Stuart

 

Don’t give up on it yet stuartp22
I have rejuvenated Darwinii by cutting it very hard back. It is a tough plant inclined to recover from hard pruning in my experience.
I would cut the whole shrub back by half, even more. Give it a balanced feed and assess it in mid summer.
Darwinii is a lovely shrub....currently mine here is smothered in orange flowers

 

Thanks for the encouragement

Where is it best to cut further would you suggest? From the top, or round the sides, or both? If I cut off some of the larger inside branches with no growth on them at all is it likely to regrow from the base?

It needs some good soil too, I think. Most of the good stuff has been scraped away with tidying over the months. Will get a bag of top soil this weekend and put some down, unless there is anything better?

Thanks for your help... this was a good find

 

Cut all of it stuartp22.
It won’t necessarily shoot from the base but rather from the cut points or even below. Mind you, it is a shrub that freely seeds or roots so have a look to see if anything has rooted at the base.
I would not use top soil....I would mulch with bark chips or compost after a good watering.
I suggest too that you look for younger green shoots, maybe 3 to 4” long and use them as cuttings.

 

Berberis is a rogue, cut it back in the spring but leave it to produce "fruit" for the autumn, birds love the berries.

 

They do indeed. They drop blue poos all over the place

 

Thanks for all the advice... There is a bit of green near the base and some higher up.

Over the weekend I'll cut it more or less down to the base then, and get rid of all the brown dead wood. Will leave any shoots near the base and try to re-plant some shoots from higher up as cuttings as suggested. All the soil there is old and needs a good scraping so will get some compost from the garden centre and put that down.

As it's right on the corner, if it grew to one or two feet high as a small bush I'd be happy. It was getting a bit big but it wasn't an excuse for the "gardener" to butcher it

Wish me luck!

 

A couple of feet is a bit short but you can trim it every year to maintain a dense evergreen pillar or other compact shape that won’t affect the flowering.

 

I guess it might take a good while to even reach 2 feet... I have little experience of how quickly they grow from more or less nothing. This one always seems to have been the size it is (was)

 

Suggests poor soil, low fertility, dry too. A balanced fertiliser, a thick mulch and regular watering will, or should, make quite a difference to its growth rate Stuart

 

OK thanks. Soil isn't great round here. Will see what I can find at the garden centre. Hopefully will be able to update this with a picture of a growing new bush before too long