If you’re growing elderberries, it’s important to know how to prune elderberry bushes for maximum growth. Here’s how to do light and hard pruning as well as how to transplant and keep elderberry offshoots from taking over an area.
Check out these blog posts if you’re looking for how to grow elderberries and planting tips or how to make elderberry syrup.
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Why I Grow Elderberries
If you’ve been around here for long, you know how much of an advocate I am for natural herbal remedies and growing as much of your own food as possible.
It’s true there are some things your climate may not allow you to grow. However, if elderberries are an option for your growing zone, then I highly recommend growing at least two bushes (you need two bushes for pollinating purposes).
I love harvesting my elderberries and preserving them, usually by dehydrating, freezing, or freeze-drying, for making these 29+ elderberry recipes. When your plants are well established, just a couple of bushes will provide ample berries for a year’s supply for your family.
Why You Should Prune Elderberry Bushes
Pruning elderberry bushes is healthy for the fruit production of the plant. Also, because I don’t want to get a ladder each year when it’s time to pick my berries, I like to prune the plant back so it’s more bush-like rather than tree-like.
Pruning elderberry bushes maintains the structure of the plant and keeps them from overtaking an area. There are different methods of pruning, so keep reading to see which option is right for you and your elderberry bushes.
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When Should You Prune Elderberry?
Pruning elderberry is best done when the plant is dormant. That means a late winter, or early spring pruning is ideal.
An elderberry bush that is less than two years old should not be pruned. You need to give the bush adequate time to establish a good root system first.
After the second year, you can lightly prune the elderberry bush to maintain the shape that you prefer, however, a hard pruning shouldn’t be done until the bush is in its fourth or fifth year.
The bushes I’m pruning in the video are five years old.
Can You Prune and Replant Elderberry Bushes?
Yes! In fact, that’s what I’m going to be doing with some of the off-shoots of my five-year-old elderberry bush. The roots have sent out runners, which have formed entirely new plants.
By digging down to the root, I can sever it from the main root system, and the bush will be able to be transplanted to a new location. This is a much faster option than obtaining cuttings. However, I do have a video and blog post on how to grow elderberry bushes from cuttings.
Both methods work similarly, however, with the larger stalks that also include the root system, I will simply transplant those directly where I want them on the Norris Farmstead.
Can You Prune Elderberry to the Ground?
Yes! It’s important to understand that elderberry bushes will send out off-shoots from the root system. This is similar to how raspberries grow new plants. If you want to keep your elderberry bush to a maintainable size, you’ll want to make sure you’re pruning back unwanted shoots each year.
How to Keep an Elderberry Bush from Spreading
To keep an elderberry bush from spreading, you can take a lawn mower and mow back the off-shoots (or runners).
They will come back each year, so you’ll need to keep up with this. Another management tool is to hard prune the bush (more on this below).
With my five-year-old plants, I’m using a combination of hard pruning and pruning to the ground. However, I’m also digging up some from the root in order to transplant the bushes where I want them growing in another area on the Norris Farmstead.
How do You Prune Overgrown Elderberry?
Unlike a fruit tree or a berry bush, you actually want to prune off overgrown bushes to about a foot off the ground.
Depending on how large you want your bush to be, you can even cut all branches off, only keeping one main stalk. For my bush, I cut down the nine main stalks to one foot from the ground.
This year each of those stalks will produce new growth, and I should expect to have a great elderberry harvest come fall.
Can You Hard Prune Elderberry?
Yes! Hard pruning an elderberry bush will give you more fruit production the following year. Hard pruning is where, instead of pruning off the branches from a main stalk, you actually prune back the main stalk to about a foot off the ground.
This doesn’t work for all fruit trees, and in some cases will actually be detrimental to the tree. However, elderberry bushes love being hard-pruned and will thank you for it with their ample growth throughout the season.
Though hard pruning may not be best every year for long-term maintenance, it’s a great option every other year or more.
If you have an elderberry bush that looks more like an elderberry tree, simply hard prune the stalk to about a foot from the ground and be amazed at the new, lower growth it puts out.
Other Berry and Fruit Growing Guides:
- How to Grow Elderberry Bushes
- How to Prune a Blueberry Bush for a Larger Harvest
- How to Get Rid of Mummy Berry Disease on Blueberry Bushes
- How to Plant Raspberries – Soil Prep, Growing & Caring for your Raspberry Plants
- How to Prune Raspberries
- How to Prune Apple Trees
- Heirloom Apple Varieties & Saving Them for Future Generations
- Planting Berry Bushes & Fruit Trees
My elderberry is still green at the end of January. Do I still prune it back even though it has leaves all over it? And can I use those cuttings to make new plants even though there’s leaves on the stocks?
Yes to both of your questions.
Great tips on pruning elderberry bushes, Melissa! I never realized how important the timing was for optimal growth. I can’t wait to try your technique this spring!
Would my berries get bigger if I don’t prune them?
My elderberry is on its 3rd year. I grew from an 8 inch cutting and it’s now well over 6 ft. I have it in a grow bag. It has yet to flower. Any tips? North Austin, Texas – zone 9a.
I’m thinking about planting elderberry in one 12×12 and one 10×10 ft hole in our shrub bed left by trees that had to be downed. One would be beside euonymus, azaleas, and arbor vitae, and the other is flanked by viburnum and spirea on both sides. I’m thinking about black lace and lemony lace, and maybe planting dwarf winterberries and red twig dogwood in front so that when we do cut them back in the future, we have something to distract from the deadness. Thoughts? Could the winterberry and dogwoods help keep runners from spreading too much?
I bought one plant about 4 years ago. It grew well and I kept pruning and growing on the cuttings. BUT, it was two years later before a single bloom then no fruit. Next year it did have one berry, plenty of blossoms and pollinators but no fruit. Last year more blossoms – no fruit. Finally, this year it is LOADED with blossoms and I noticed the cutting I started (now 5 feet tall) was covered in blossoms. Until I read this article, I didn’t know it needed a 2nd bush. Actually asked my SIL to cut them all down – maybe they heard me. I’ve asked several people and read many articles but never read that I needed two. I have way more than that this year as all the cuttings are about 3 feet tall and I guess I’m about to experience a windfall. Thanks for a great informative article – so glad I read this. Now to make sure SIL doesn’t cut.
Mary,
You need two DIFFERENT varieties of elderberry. Two of the exact same plant won’t pollinate one another.
That’s odd because we planted one elderberry bush and have berries on it and it’s a year old!
That’s fantastic, there’s likely another pollinator in the vicinity that’s helping to pollinate it.
It’s estimated 30% of our native bees are stem nesting, meaning they need pithy or hollow stems like elderberry, to nest in and survive the winter.
Ideally the gardener would cut stems at a variety of heights between 8″ to 24″ tall, leave the stalks standing in the second year for nesting opportunities.
Xerxes has great information on planting with wildlife in mind.
I have elderberries, three years in a pot and the last two years in the ground. They flower profusely particularly since being in the ground however the flowers are not fragrant and they don’t set berries at all. Should I keep them in the hope this will correct itself or get rid of them and plant others. I live in a temperate climate. Your opinion is much appreciated.
Hello. I’m a bit confused reading. If you prune, will the new shoots produce flowers and berries that same year. Or only the following year? Thanks!j
What elderberries are you pruning ? Black or red and would you treat them the same?
I’m not finding the video on how to prune elderberry bushes for maximum growth attached to this post. Please advise.