Summer’s in full swing, and your previously glorious flowers are starting to look a little ragged around the edges.
Many plants will benefit-and even rebloom-after a mid-summer session of “deadheading,” that is, removing spent flowers and/or stems to promote new growth.
Here’s a quick guide of deadheading techniques for different types of flowers:
Pinch off individual dead flowers on balloonflower, bellflower, daylily, delphinium, foxglove, hibiscus, hollyhock. (Also included: some irises that will rebloom in the fall, depending on the variety.)
Do an overall snip of dead blooms (about 2″ below the flower) on blanketflower, columbine, globe thistle, goldenrod, geranium, Jacob’s ladder, salvia, coreopsis/tickseed.
Cut the entire spent flower stem off to either a side shoot or to the plant’s base on baby’s breath, bleeding heart, cardinal flower, catmint, coral bells, foamflower, gaura, Jupiter’s beard, lavender, lupine, mullein, painted daisy, pincushion flower, coneflower, Shasta daisy, speedwell, spiderwort, Stoke’s aster.
(Listening to The Grateful Dead while deadheading is, of course, optional.)