Beginner’s guide: how to grow and prune honeysuckle

‘G

raham Thomas’ is wrapped round our dustbins. And what better than a honeysuckle to disguise the spot where the bins must stand. Also, what better plant to have named after oneself, if one were the National Trust’s first chief gardens adviser, than a beautiful, heavenly-scented honeysuckle? It’s a pale creamy yellow, the flowers arranged in those big swirling clusters that tell you it’s a variety of our own native woodbine, Lonicera periclymenum.

Honeysuckles can be shrubs, but they are better known as climbers. They vary a great deal, in vigour, colour and flower type, so if you like the idea of a climber, you need to know what you’re getting and whether to encourage it or not.

Lonicera periclymenum ‘Graham Thomas’

GAP PHOTOS/NICOLA STOCKEN