It’s not just trees and shrubs that need pruning: flowering perennials, annuals and bedding plants will make more flowers, better quality blooms or bushier plants with the odd nip and tuck. There are several easy, undemanding techniques that can be carried out while you are pottering around the garden.
What to do
- Remove spent flower spikes of lupins, delphiniums, verbascums and foxgloves to make a second flush of flowers.
- Deadhead fading flowers of bedding plants, annuals and herbaceous perennials to stimulate new blooms and prevent plants from self-seeding.
- While small, remove growing tips of some perennials and bedding plants to make bushier plants. Read more about this on the next page.
- Some perennials benefit from being reduced by half in May to make more sturdy, compact plants.
- Recycle the flower spikes, blooms and stems you remove by putting them on the compost heap.
