MAY IS A time to tend to your mums and flowering sedums and Asters by cutting them down.
That’s right — timber, buzz job, cutaway.
We all know how those spectacular fall-flowering plants get all gangly, loose and flop all over the place.
Their un-pinched characteristic is inherently a very tall stringy plant that wind and rain can cause to droop on the ground.
The solution is simple: Cut them back today to a level 3 or 4 inches above the ground.
Yes, I know these plants could already be 8- to 12-inches tall and, yes, you can see flower buds on the mums. But that’s just tough luck.
Remember, in the plant world you must spend flowers to make flowers. Pinching these items will accomplish two responses of great benefit.
First, this pinch will produce more branches, which will not only keep the plants shorter, but allow all those branches to tangle with each other creating a web that helps hold the plant together above the ground.
Second, this multitude of new branches will allow your plant to explode with flowers at a rate of three or four fold. The real super duper trick on these fall bloomers is to pinch again before July 4, at about 2 or 3 inches above today’s cut. Caution: Do not pinch after July 4 or your plant won’t have enough time to flower this fall.
Pesky caterpillars
Next are those pesky caterpillars. Look for them, hunt them down with a vengeance and destroy them. Remember, each caterpillar, or tents, will lay hundreds of eggs when they become moths, and next year the devastation they cause will definitely be noticeable.
Do not use chemical sprays on these guys, because those indiscriminately kill all bugs, including the good guys.
The best eradication method is smashing them. I use a cloth or old towel, wrap it around the tent and squeeze hard. The feeling and noise this creates is stimulating, to say the least.
Pulling off the tent and putting them in plastic bags is also great, along with pruning out the tents and disposing them by burning.
Do these tricks early in the morning or at twilight because 100 percent of these little eating machines will be in there bivouac.
Water woes
Water is the next item. Please water your big trees and any new plantings. We are already seeing drought-like stress, and it is only May.
Your lovely shade trees have had two years of warm and dry conditions. Year No. 3 can push them over the edge. Deep-root feeders are the way to go, or water heavily for 4 or 5 hours with a sprinkler and repeat each 2 weeks.
Container time
Finally the most important issue: Baskets.
Hanging baskets, window boxes or decorative pots are the one mandatory item I asked each person to get and display prominently.
If everyone would display just one basket or pot, we would instantly become flower Peninsula USA. So please, work with me here.
Just last week I told you how to make them shine until November.
To close, let us all become “proficient pinchers” and cut back those autumn sedum, asters and mums. (And get a container of flowers.)
And remember … stay well all!
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Andrew May is a freelance writer and ornamental horticulturist who dreams of having Clallam and Jefferson counties nationally recognized as “Flower Peninsula USA.” Send him questions c/o Peninsula Daily News, P.O. Box 1330, Port Angeles, WA 98362, or email news@peninsuladailynews.com (subject line: Andrew May).
