Hello NOAHLEE,
Welcome to the gardeners helpers forum!!
Great bunch of gardeners here and glad to have you on board.
I am no expert like Bill, Barb and Nikkal, and Carol and Will Creed....... the list goes on.......
But I have taken shoots off of an old
lilac bush and it does take some time but they do eventually bloom. I lived in a house that had the side shoots and when I moved I took two babies to remember the house.
I put them in pots, gave them to my dad for at least 3 yrs. to hold for me til I got a garden going, he did absolutely nothing to them, I then finally got them the 4th yr. and planted them here (no blooms the whole time mind you!!) And the first year still no blooms and finally the 8th year it bloomed!!
So, I'd say a bit of patients.
But I have a question????
You said something to the effect of it had side shoots on it....... Discribe the side shoots??? From the ground around the base or branches on the one stalk????
If there is side shoots from the bottom of the main trunk, you want to clip those or repot them to save.....But when you leave on the sprouts that come up from the ground, they call those sucker shoots and supposedly suck the energy out of the main
plant and you won't get
flowers and/or many.......
So try getting them out. Most the time you would just take clippers to them, but maybe if you're sentimental about the
lilac, figure out how to transplant like you did the first shoot from your mom's bush.
Love ya Bunny, you trim the bush after the
flowers turn brown, but don't ever clip, or trim the branches of a
lilac bush in the
spring as you'll be clipping the
flowers off.......
lilac's set the
flowers shortly after flowering. You have a window of opportunity to trim the bush right after flowering, to resize/reshape or just clip of
flower stalks.
So, be patient a bit more I think.. It should bloom.
What color was your mother's
lilac bush????
Stick around lots' of good info and advice and lots' of fun gardeners....
Let us know us know your progress!!!!!!!
Happy Gardening!!
Weezie