To Deadhead or not to Deadhead?

One decision to be made by every gardener is whether or not to deadhead plants in the perennial garden. Well it depends on what kind of garden you the gardener want to have. As individuals have different tastes, so it goes with gardens. There are all different kinds of gardens as well as reasons for having gardens.

There can be many things to think about regarding this decision. First you need to decide if you want to let your plants reseed themselves, and when in the season you want to have this happen.
In my gardens right now there are several varieties that have already seeded themselves and have seedlings sprouting up in many areas. Certain varieties need to reseed or they will die out. These are the biennials, such as Foxglove, Forget-me-not, Money plant and Queen Anne's Lace.

Whereas perennials come up every year, and annuals only live for the current season, biennials have a two year cycle. The first year they develop, the second they bloom, produce seed and die off. These plants will only continue to grow in your garden if you let it produce its seed and sow it.

For example, take the Forget-me not. I planted seed for it originally. It started growing the first year and developed into a nice little immature plant. The second year it grew to full size and bloomed profusely, but only in the early spring. When the flowers died, I left the stems on the plants to allow the seeds to form. I did not cut the plant back until all the seedlings started to grow.



Leaving the plant in place with the wilted stems while the seeds develop provides cover for the developing seeds to sprout. If I had cut off the flower stems after they bloomed (this is called deadheading), the plant would have died back as expected, no seeds would have been able to develop, and then there would have been no plants the following year. I do not cut off the flower stems until the majority of the seed has been distributed (come off the stem) and new little seedlings have begun.

An alternative to this would be to buy new seeds every year to sow when the mature plants are in bloom. This provides the new seedlings for the next year's plants, and the opportunity to just remove the older plants after they finish blooming. This is a neater approach, as you don't have to contend with the straggly stems going to seed. My preference is to leave the stems, let the plant seed itself and clean it up after I harvest the seeds, which only takes a few weeks.




This year, in the Daylily bed I found that the Forget-me-nots were so plentiful that the seed producing stems were getting in the way of developing Daylilies. The Daylilies were having trouble penetrating the maze of seed laden stems. I made room for the emerging Daylilies by physically pushing the Forget-me-not stems down on the ground so that they surrounded the Daylilies, rather than being right on top and prohibiting their growth. I have now cut back all the seeded stems to harvest the seed, and the Daylilies have plenty of room to stretch themselves out in!
As these produce a huge amount of seed, we now have hundreds of seedlings coming up all around the second year plants, which will die off at the end of this season. Allowing all the seeds to grow is how I achieved the mass of forget-me-not blooms in the spring. I personally like this effect so much so, that I am adding it around other areas of the gardens. Others may decide to limit the area where the Forget-me-not comes up, or how many plants will be allowed to mature for the next years showing. In order to limit the plants, you can either deadhead some of the seeding stems, or pull up seedlings that come up in areas you don't want them in.

I decide about deadheading on a plant to plant basis. I let the Forget-me-not go to seed all over and then decide in the spring if I want to keep all the plants growing or not. They are real easy to move to a new location.

Money Plant is similar to Forget-me-not in that it blooms in early spring, sets it seeds and then that plant will die off and new seedlings will come up if the plant is left to seed. This plant has beautiful foliage once the seeds have been harvested. It is a favorite for dried flower arrangements. It does not produce as many seeds as the Forget-me not, so is not as time consuming to keep under control. I harvest most the seed stems leaving a few plants to keep up the reseeding process.




Queen Anne's Lace will bloom all season. It produces a lot of seeds, and will spread everywhere, so I deadhead it all season and then let a few plants go to seed at the end of the season.




If I'm not sure about wildflowers (or weeds) that come up randomly, I wait until they flower so that I can find out what it is and decide if I want it in the garden or not. It is sometimes a lengthy process, but one that has really paid off this year.

There was a random plant coming up in my wild bed at the end of the driveway. It was a strange looking, tall, thin, spindly plant with very interesting purplish whorled leaves and a very tiny white flower. As I love purple, and different foliage plants, and I didn't know what it was, or where it came from, I decided to let it all stay - there was quite a bit of it, just growing up from who knows where. Anyway, I finally got it identified, and in the meantime was enjoying the way they all swayed in the wind - they grew to about 3-4' tall, a nice contrast among the Black Eyed Susans, Liatris and Anise Hyssop.









I was finally able to identify them as Smooth Rock Cress, and imagine my surprise when I found them on the threatened species list for MA. I am so grateful that I had not considered them just another weed and pulled them all up!! As far as I know they are only found in western MA. I am following up on them with the MA Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

As for the perennials, I am letting most of them go to seed this year to see what the full process entails. Usually by now I have cut all the Peonies way down, and would have cut back all Columbines and others so as to look nicer in the gardens. Instead I am spending that time harvesting seeds and relearning about the seed process. It has been years since I did this, so its fun to learn it again. This time I have a digital camera and can record all the stages and have access to the pictures right away. No waiting for them to be developed like we used to have to in teh "olden days"!