The Obsessive Neurotic Gardener

Posted on by Posted in How-to, Perennials, Pruning .
Back in the middle of June, I had written about my pruning experiment with my three Sneezeweed plants. I was closely following the advice of the legendary “plantswoman” Tracy DiSabato-Aust by pruning back in June for size control. 
Today, I will give you an update on all three plants as I know you all have been anxiously awaiting the results.
Sneezeweed #1 – cut back by 1/2 in June as seen below:    
And how it looks today:

Blooming has clearly been delayed and so far so good on how it is holding up and not flopping.

Of course, the real test is once the blooms explode in the next few weeks.

**Quick note: Please ignore the ugly legs on this one; they are actually covered by another plant but you cannot tell by this photo. Pinky swear.

Sneezeweed #2 – This one was pruned back in June naturally by some creature one night, so I left it alone as is. Ultimately, it was at the same size as #1 after it was pruned:

And how friggin wonderful it looks today:

This one clearly bloomed earlier than #1 and immediately collapsed under all of it’s bloomage. On the surface, this makes no sense when compared to #1.

But after some detective work, the roots of this one were inundated with water and it was more exposed to the huge rains and winds we’ve had the past few weeks.

This one will be relocated in the near future.

Sneezeweed #3 – This one was left untouched back in June with the thought being it would be sufficiently supported by its neighboring plants:  

So far so good, as the blooms have appeared and it is still standing at attention:

As the blooms continue to multiply we’ll see if it still remains upright. Fingers are double crossed.

I’ll hold off on the final analysis for a few more weeks as this situation is still fluid.

Until then …

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5 Responses

  1. So your Helenium hasn’t bloomed at all this year? Am I understanding that correctly? Or did you prune it after the first bloom? Our seasons are a little different so I am not sure. Mine have been blooming since mid-late June.

  4. I too have a clump of Helenium in a small border and last summer noticed that they got too gangly, and fell over with the weight of flower heads. So it is now late May in the east of the UK, they are about 2 feet tall, and this year I am going to prune them back in mid June and see how they do…. In general gardening principles this should make them bush out… but as to flowere proliferation.. I’ll wait and see.. !!!! Sultan4swing…

    • So I just cut my sneeze weed back by 2/3 and I’ve never grown it before but it was flipping over like crazy. It’s June 15th here- when will they bloom again this summer?

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