In Horticulture, Patience Is Truly A Virtue

As the flowers of spring fade, many of the plants that they belonged to need some special care — and if this isn’t done, next spring, the flower may suffer the consequences.

Spring-flowering bulbs are the first that come to mind, including daffodil and tulips. While you may not like the tattered look of the foliage that they leave behind after flowering, if you remove this foliage you are removing the energy source that leads to the formation of next year’s flowers. Cut the foliage before it’s totally brown, or even bunch the foliage, and there will be a consequence next spring.

A bulb that is a particular challenge in terms of spring foliage are some of the early-flowering alliums, such as Purple Sensation, which blooms out here in mid-May. The globe-like flowers sit atop 3-foot-tall stems, but within a week of flowering the foliage starts to brown. It’s a very quick transition, and if you happen to plant these bulbs at the edge of a garden, the foliage can look pretty awful.

It’s a trade-off. I just leave mine, since the flowers are so, well, sensational. I leave the spent flowers on the plant for weeks, because they add a structural element to the garden, as well as a focal point. But as soon as the foliage is all brown, it gets snipped.

The same holds true for some of our rhododendrons. You don’t want these plants going into a seed production frenzy, and the seed heads can look pretty unsightly.

On the hybrids, the seed head removal is primarily aesthetic, but on the species Rhodys, seed head removal is important for flower production for next year. Leave the seed head on and flower production is dramatically reduced. Snip the seed head off and you encourage the production of new flower buds during this growing season that will flower next year.

Lilac flowers also present an interesting challenge. When the flowers lose their color they should be cut off to encourage new flower buds to be formed for next year. But if you don’t do routine reductions of the plant, the flowers occur higher and higher every year and are more difficult to prune off. Of course, if you don’t remove the flowers, the plant doesn’t stop flowering, but the flower production can be reduced by half.

One “trick” on lilacs is to prune them lightly every year, or to reduce the number of stems by one-third every year, to constantly rejuvenate the shrub. Cut all the stems and you may not have flowers for several years. But by using the one-third method, there are still flowers every year, and by the fourth year you’ve completely rejuvenated the plants, which are then much easier to maintain at a manageable height.

And if you like lilacs, remember that there are standards as well as dwarfs, and they can range in color from the classic purples and pinks to white, near red and yellow.

Have you noticed that every vegetable seed packet gives you a “days to harvest” number? In theory, this is the number of days from the day you plant until the day you can harvest. In theory. I don’t know who did the original testing to come up with these numbers, as they are clearly “perfect world” numbers, or maybe simply fantasy.

One that always sticks in my mind are the Cherry Belle radishes. The packet says 22 days from seeding to harvest. Have you ever had such good fortune? At 32 days, my Cherry Belles were about an eighth of an inch in diameter. And peas may be even worse. Sugar Snaps should be 70 days to harvest, and the new Easy Peasy, 60 to 65 days. Stay tuned.

Oh, and then there’s the price of the seed. Easy Peasy was about $4.20 for 21 grams. And just how many seeds is that? Some catalogs give you that breakdown, but not the seed packets.

I know, I know, and I hear you: “But they are home grown!” Well, yes, they are, but for $4.20 you can buy a lot of fresh peas at some local farm markets, green grocers and even supermarkets. Buy the seeds in larger packets or bulk and it becomes more economical, but my vegetable garden is really tiny.

It’s hard to tell if there’s a garden fence shortage or just a supply chain issue due to high demand.

A carpenter told me that at the end of May one of his clients asked to have 3-foot-tall rabbit fencing installed around the vegetable garden. The big-box store was sold out. The hardware store told him they had none in stock but hoped they’d be “on next week’s truck.” Garden centers, pretty much the same response.

But with everyone growing their own this year, I can understand the demand issue.

And then there’s my Magnolia “Red Baron.” I bought it five years ago to add to my collection, and when it arrived it was no more than 3 feet tall. It grew taller every year, and it’s now about 12 feet tall. It looks wonderful.

And every year I look forward to it flowering. It hadn’t. But in mid-May, I got one lonely but beautiful flower. In horticulture, patience is truly a virtue.

I did some research, and the literature about the plant and its flowers is glowing. But when I went to check on the Dave’s Garden database, sure enough, there was a note from a woman going back to 2012. Seems she, too, had waited five years and finally got a flower.

Be patient. Those radishes eventually will get larger, the peas will flower and be prolific, and maybe next year everything will flower on time and in abundance. Gardeners live on hope and toil.

Keep growing!