How to Prepare Topiary Plants

Although topiaries are available for purchase, it's rewarding and fun to construct and grow one yourself. Topiaries can be trained from any shrub well-suited to trimming, like hollies, ivies, boxwood and rosemary. Flowering plants, like lantana, fuchsia and hydrangea, also work well for topiaries. Once it's been completed, a topiary--rosemary or otherwise--is a formally trimmed plant, most commonly seen in the shape of a lollipop.

Young potted topiary plant
Scissors
Stakes
Ties

Instructions

- 1
  Place a stake beside the plant and bury it in the potting soil. Tie the stake to the plant, using the ties. The plant should grow straight up, to a height of 12 to 36 inches.
- 2
  Maintain your topiary over the next several weeks. Cut off any wild shoots that grow from the plant. Check the ties often to make sure they're secure, and check for bugs living inside the ties.
- 3
  Turn the plant often. Feed it every four to five waterings with all-purpose fertilizer.
- 4
  When the plant has reached its ideal height, form the top of your topiary. Before you start, decide on the shape you want. You might choose between one-ball, two-ball and three-ball standards. Other choices are pyramids and tree shapes. Once you've decided, pinch growth off the trunk below your chosen design, and trim the body of your topiary.
- 5
  Over the next several months, train the plant using careful pruning methods. Always pinch or cut at the nodes (joints) of the plant, so you can control the direction of the growth. Shoots growing upward will grow more quickly, so take that into account as the plant grows into its topiary design.
- 6
  Trim your topiary plant on a regular basis. Topiaries should be trimmed quite often, to keep them dense. Prune your topiary whenever you notice it getting shaggy, but trim only until it meets the shape requirements.

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