Jul

17

Deadheading Flowers

Posted by maureen

July 17, 2007 |

There are several reason why you deadhead (get rid of the spent flowers) on a plant. Removing flowers as they fade makes the garden look neater, prevents unwanted self-sown seedlings and often stimulates a plant to continue blooming longer than it would if left alone, or to bloom a second time later in the season. This is true for shrubs and annuals as well as for perennials.
There are three different ways to deadhead and these depend on the plant and the reason for cutting it back

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Individual Flowers
Soft-stemmed annuals and perennials can be deadheaded by hand. As soon as they fade, snap off flowers with your fingers or use scissors or pruning shears for those with tougher stems. Large flowers like daisies, day lilies irises and lilies can be snapped off by hand but you will need to use scissors or hand pruning shears for annuals such as marigolds.

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Flower cluster
Small flowers that bloom in clusters atop branched stems need to be deadheaded in stages to keep them blooming and not reseeding. Plants like Shasta daises and tall garden phlox are examples of plants which benefit from selective cutting; rather than snipping off the entire stem simply cut the main flower: you will notice lower side shoots beginning to bud and bloom. This is true on many plants. These secondary buds will now flower and bloom.

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Entire Flower - Shrubby plants with many small flowers.
It can be time consuming to remove individual flowers from perennials that produce lots of blooms over the entire plant. These can be sheared as soon as the majority of flowers fade. Use this method on plants such as dianthus, baby’s breath, so that you won’t have to look at drying seed heads all summer.

The dead flower heads of certain plants can look attractive in fall or winter and these can be left in tact. The dead heads of many hydrangeas, for example, turn bronze and purple hues as the leaves dry out. Do not deadhead plants that are grown for decorative fruits or seed heads. If you want to save some seeds for the next season, allow one or two blooms to wither on each plant. Harvest the seeds when the pods are dry and ripe

Here is a list of flowers that will bloom longer if deadheaded

Hardy geraniums
Coreopsis
Petunias
Marigolds
Snapdragons
Begonias
Roses
Campanulas
Blanket flowers
Delphiniums
Zinnias
Sweet peas
Salvia
Scabiosa
Annual heliotrope
Geraniums (Pelargonium)
Tulips
Daffodils
Yarrow

No Need To Deadhead
Grasses
Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’
Melampodium
Impatiens
Most flowering vines
Lythrum
Most ground covers
Crocuses and other “minor” spring-blooming bulbs
Wishbone flower (Torenia)


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