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If you want your container plants to grow healthy, prune them. Not just a shaping method, pruning helps limit root growth –especially important in the confines of a container – while also keeping your plants looking fresh and well-tended. Photo Credit: ©2000 Dolezal Publishing/Tim Butler Shape your container plant by snipping away long branches with slanted cuts made right above latent buds, or nodes. These are easy to identify by examining where leaf stems join the branch. Nodes are left when leaves drop from the branch. Each new terminal node – the one closest to the cut – will soon sprout a new shoot. Photo Credit: ©2000 Dolezal Publishing/Tim Butler Your container plant’s roots will grow more slowly because there’s less foliage remaining above, which means slower photosynthesis. Photo Credit: ©2000 Dolezal Publishing/Tim Butler Deadheading allows new annual or perennial flowers to continue blossoming, effectively extending the blooming season. Cut away the entire faded flower stem in a pair or cluster. Photo Credit: ©2000 Dolezal Publishing/John M. Rickard Pinching is a hands-on method of removing old growth to encourage further blooms, bushier clusters or larger blossoms. Take the foliage or immature flower buds you want to remove between your thumb and forefinger and just pinch them off. Photo Credit: ©2000 Dolezal Publishing/Kyle Chesser “Really?” you might ask. If you’re a newcomer to gardening, it sure may seem like the opposite of what you should do to get your plants to grow. But think of pruning like a good haircut, cutting off damaged ends and redirecting growth in a healthy way. In truth, proper shaping, trimming and thinning keep container plants growing strong from season to season. For the plants, pruning sort of re-creates events that take place in nature when animals crop and feed on foliage. Like that haircut, pruning cuts are irreversible. But even when a “mistake” means cutting a stem or branch back a little further to properly direct a growth pattern, chances are it’ll be for the best, and the plant will be strengthened as a result. And as with any good haircut, you shouldn’t just start cutting at a plant willy-nilly. Pruning is a measure for maintaining a healthy plant, so it includes the removal of dead or dying stems or branches, as well as those that are weak, ill or growing off course. The goal is for the strongest and straightest branches to thrive. That means cutting all that straggly or weak growth from the center of the plant to direct energy toward the stronger branches. Occasionally, pruning also means clipping flowers, but usually toward the end of their bloom cycle. Annuals, in particular, need to be cut back as soon as the seed heads start to form on the dying flowers. Called deadheading, this pruning practice halts an annual’s natural urge for propagation in favor of more flowers and a longer blooming season. To deadhead, simply cut or pinch the seed head back to the flower stem joint. This will help make your annuals grow more bushy and full, forcing new branches and shoots to grow. When you should prune your container plant depends on whether the plant relies on a previous year’s growth or entirely new growth to produce flowers the next year. Hydrangeas and camellias, for example, bloom on old growth, so they should be pruned at the end of the season (after it’s done flowering) in anticipation of the following year’s growth. Azaleas and many roses, however, require new growth to flower, so prune those plants when buds appear or during a plant’s dormant months. Of course, it’s always the right season to thin out unproductive growth, remove diseased or dead foliage and flowers, cut to train a climbing plant, or shear a shrub to refine or reduce its shape. Just remember to think of pruning like that haircut: When your plants start to lose their shapes or don’t look healthy, bring out the shears and shape carefully.
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