"Dwight Sipler" wrote in message
...
"umvoti" opined:

Does anyone know of a growth retardant for hanging baskets,
particularly Petunias? Needed to stop the plant bolting
but to flower profusely...



There are several chemicals that are used to control growth: e.g.
Florel, Bonzi, B-Nine and Sumagic (I believe these are all trade names).
Florel is one of the oldest ones and it works by maintaining the plant
in a vegetative state (non-flowering) while the plant is being treated.
This encourages branching and helps to keep the internodes short for a
bushier plant. I haven't used the others, but there are different modes
of operation, particularly in the newer regulators.

However, Florel won't really control petunias once you stop treating
them so they can flower. Your best bet is to change the variety of
petunia you are growing to one with a more compact habit.

Can't you just pinch out the tops when young to cause branching and then use a
low nitrogen flowering fertilizer? I have the old fashion self seeding kind
in my yard and that works on them.

I pinch the tops out at least 2 or 3 times to get multiple stalks from each
plant before letting them go and don't use over a 4% nitrogen fertilizer about
once a month. I have solid masses of lavender & white flowers. This variety
still gets close to 24 inches, but that's over the whole growing season.

Tom J