Master Gardener Ann Bartlett gives us tips on deadheading flowers to ensure colorful flower beds throughout the summer.
One garden task I really find tedious is deadheading—removing spent flower blossoms from a plant. Deadheading prevents seed formation, and it makes the garden look tidy. (Gathering bouquets is also an enjoyable way to achieve the same end.)
Deadheading Annuals
Annual plants sprout, grow to maturity, and reproduce in one season. Once sufficient seed has been set, flowering ceases, and the plant dies. As your marigolds and zinnias go to seed, it is essential to deadhead if you want color until frost.
In the case of petunias, a midsummer pinch-back accompanied by an application of liquid fertilizer provides renewed vigor to go the distance.
Some annuals are “self-cleaning.” Impatiens, the color mainstay of the shade garden, is one. Sun-loving vinca is another. Flowers suitable for use in dry arrangements, for example gomphrena, continue to look decorative even when not harvested for indoor use.
Deadheading Perennial Plants
Perennial plants also benefit from deadheading. Some, for example daffodils, bloom only once a year. Their bulbs are weakened if the flowers go to seed. Once mine have finished blooming, I lop off their heads, leaving the foliage to feed the bulbs for next year’s show. M
any perennials produce flowers over several weeks or months. A few of these — Shasta daisies, garden phlox, and coreopsis — will produce more flowers if spent ones are promptly removed. In October, let the last cone flowers go to seed to feed birds during winter.
Roses do flower more if spent blossoms are removed. Use a bypass pruner to cut the stem back about a quarter inch above an outward facing bud and five-leaflet leaf. Promoting outward growth promotes better air circulation, reducing fungal disease on the foliage. I clean my pruner with an antiseptic wipe between bushes to prevent moving disease bearing organisms from shrub to shrub.
So, off with their heads! Whether through selective pinching or wholesale shearing, perk up those posies for a resplendent show until frost.