The Rebel Gardener

In my last article about Grevillea Robusta, the Silky Oak, I wrote about the fact that seed grown trees often take some years to flower and the possibility that trees propagated from cuttings may actually flower a lot sooner. The other issue with Grevillea Robusta is the fact that most of the flowers are held quite high in the tree and are quite difficult to admire up close.

I’ve often wondered if there was something that could be done to solve this problem, especially since this tree looks so spectacular when in flower. This reminded me of a Grevillea Robusta that I once saw growing under some powerlines that had been pruned quite heavily to limit it’s growth. This tree was about 4 or 5 metres tall and had an wide canopy that actually made the tree look quite attractive. It occurred to me then and there that Grevillea Robusta was indeed quite receptive to heavy pruning.

I then decided to pursue this line of thought that then led me to the obvious idea that instead of waiting until the tree is 3 or 4 metres tall, why not just prune it right from the start and in an attempt to prune it into a bush rather than it’s natural tree habit. Now I must say right from the start some gardeners may be skeptical about the ability to limit the size of a tall tree such as Grevillea Robusta in such a manner. But then again if it is possible to do so by pruning it at 3 or 4 metres to keep it to no more than 5 or 6 metres in overall height then why couldn’t you just prune it at ground level to turn it into a bush that is 3 or 4 metres tall.

Imagine this, Grevillea Robusta grown from a cutting (from a superior specimen). Then successively pruned as required until it branches prolifically to produce a rounded bush. Then when it flowers, it’s covered in it’s trademark orangey, yellow flowers that extend nearly all the way down to ground level. Wouldn’t that just look spectacular?

So what I’ve decided to do is go ahead and do it. Now for me though unfortunately I haven’t got enough room to do it in the ground so I’ve decided to grow one in a pot and here’s what I did.

This wasn't the best specimen of a Grevillea Robusta I could find but it did have lots of branches.

First of all I went to a nursery to purchase a Grevillea Robusta. Normally I would have selected a plant with one straight single trunk but for the purpose of the exercise I decided to select one that had several branches on it already.

Next up was to take it home and then prune it encourage it to branch even more.

Then re pot it into a larger pot, add some water granules so it is always moist and also some low phosphorus native fertilizer so it never goes hungry.

The idea here being to pamper the plant (something I don’t normally like to do) so as to optimize it’s growth potential.

Grevillea Robusta, now pruned and in a larger pot full of water granules and Native plant fertilizer.

The other thing to mention here is that the plant that I’ve selected has most probably been grown from seed so it may take some years to flower. The important thing though is that I’m trying to see how much I can get it to branch into a shrub rather grow into a tree.

As far as flowering goes though, what I intend to do is find a Grevillea Robusta that is mature and does appear to be a good specimen tree so I can try propagating it from cuttings in an attempt to then compare it against the seed grown one. So over a period of time there can be a comparison between the flowering and the growth rates.

This of course will take time but in the meantime my main objective is to just to see how much I can get this Grevillea Robusta to branch while growing in a pot.

So there you have it an alternative method to grow Grevillea Robusta but a while ago I saw something that made me think there may be another way of growing this tree.

As I’ve said before, Grevillea Robusta is quite often used as a rootstock for grafting other less reliable Grevilleas. Not long ago I was in a nursery and saw a grafted Grevillea with a scion that wasn’t growing very well at all. As a result the Grevillea Robusta rootstock had started to grow a shoot just below the graft that was actually doing better than the scion.

This then led me to wonder if you could actually coppice a mature Grevillea Robusta that was struggling as described in the previous article to rejuvenate it and then maybe grow it into a shrub as suggested above. I then went home and researched it and what I discovered was that it wasn’t considered to be a tree that you could coppice. Nevertheless that grafted grevillea had in fact grown a shoot just as you’d expect a coppiced tree to do so. So maybe it is possible.

Now I wouldn’t advocate for a minute that somebody should cut down their Grevillea Robusta to find out. But on the other hand, trees do from time to time get old and do get cut down because of it. This would in fact be a perfect opportunity to leave the stump in the ground and see if it does re shoot. You never know, you may just end up with a new plant because of it.

So there you have it. Whether you’d like to grow a Grevillea Robusta from scratch or if you’d just like to rejuvenate an old one here’s a couple of alternative ways to grow it.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Grevillea “Pink Ice”
• Grevillea Petrophiloides
• Grevillea Rosmarinifolia
• Silky Oak, what you really need to know
• Grevillea, How to grow.