hi, the majority of my upright fuschias which i bought from parkers mail order seem to have survived the winter with simply being wrapped in fleece and are now finally putting on some good growth after i cut them back hard when the first new growth appeared earlier this year.

two questions:

how long do new shoots have to be before you pinch out the tip?

how often do you do this during the growing season? Is it just once to promote bushier plants & let them get on with the business of flowering or does anyone do it more to produce plants with even more flowers?

Appreciate your help!

Tiger303 wrote:
hi, the majority of my upright fuschias which i bought from parkers mail
order seem to have survived the winter with simply being wrapped in
fleece and are now finally putting on some good growth after i cut them
back hard when the first new growth appeared earlier this year.

two questions:

how long do new shoots have to be before you pinch out the tip?

how often do you do this during the growing season? Is it just once to
promote bushier plants & let them get on with the business of flowering
or does anyone do it more to produce plants with even more flowers?

Appreciate your help!



Hi Tiger,

I pinch out new shoots after 2 sets of leaves have formed.
How many times you do this depends a lot on what the type of fuschia -
some are more naturally 'bushy' whilst others tend to continue growing
upwards!
You pinch to get a bushier plant then just let it get on flowering with
no more pinching

I just keep pinching till the plant looks a good shape but remember that
each pinch delays flowering by a few weeks - you don't really want a
perfectly formed plant that doesn't flower till the end of the season :-)

HTH

Jeff
NE England

thanks jeff