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19-05-2003, 08:56 PM

In article ,
(Frogleg) wrote:

On Sat, 17 May 2003 09:05:28 -0700,
(paghat) wrote:
a very few will actually be slowed down in
their blooming if you deadhead (those which bloom multiple times on the
same stems in particular).

Ex? I'm curious. I kind of figure most things that *may* re-bloom are
encouraged to do so when pruned or harvested, and most that *don't*,
like glads and daffodils, are better off deadheaded just to keep
energy from going into seed production. But I'm unaware of anything
that really pouts when spent blooms are removed.

Many types of campanulas bloom all along the stems & even if no buds are
visible, more are apt to develop. When someone lops off a stem because the
first blooms are no longer attractive, there's ten, fifteen additional
blooms that will never be. Also many semi-evergreen campanula & penstemon
cultivars, by picking out the sex organs before they seed, but not cutting
the stems, it is possible to get them to rebloom (here in Zone 8) all the
way to January or even March. Even if many of the leaves get scruffy or
partially die back, a saved stem will still stand there blooming.
Encouraging this behavior "tires" the clump however & it is slow to
recover in spring, as I discovered by experimenting; so in the future I'll
take back the stems in late autumn & so have them reblooming "only" up to
the start of winter, then let them rest or work on their roots only.

I've had other sorts of things get annoyed with being deadheaded -- two
clumps of sterile tickseed flowers, their conditions otherwise identical
planted side by side, the one which I experimentally deadheaded stopped
blooming in summer, the one I never touched bloomed well into autumn.
(Some types of sterile flowers attempt to hold out until they are
pollinated & produce seed, which never happens; with the tickseed it
looked like interupting their persistent reblooming stopped it from
blooming at all, though there were only the two clumps to judge by so
could've been a fluke.)

-paghat

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/