Hi, this flowers on last years growth, so if you prune as soon as the flowers fade, your plant will have all summer to put new growth on, for flowers next year, they respond well to quite hard pruning, Derek.

Thank you Derek, that's great.

Jan - if you go my home page, you can access two blogs which I wrote back in January 2008, which tell you why, how, and when to prune. You might find them a useful reference.

The great thing about forsythia is you can cut as much as you want for the house and know you're getting your pruning done at the same time! Got a vase of it on the table right now.

Thank you! That's great! Nice idea about cutting the branches for inside, hadn't thought of that.

Not only that but you can bring them in quite a long time before the flowers open and they open in the warmth - you can have a succession of them before they are out in the garden if your bush is big enough.