If You Deadhead Mums Will They Bloom Again

seven Common Mistakes You're Probably Making with Your Fall Mums

Here's what to avoid and then your chrysanthemums will last as long every bit possible and have the prettiest blooms.

Gorgeous mums in shades of cerise, xanthous, orangish, imperial, and white popular upwards everywhere in the fall. I like to use them for autumn displays on my porch, along with stale cornstalks, gourds, and pumpkins. After the flowers finally finish blooming, sometimes equally belatedly as Nov in my warm Southern climate, I often try to plant them in my garden because about mums are actually perennials that survive the winter. But past the following jump, my plants are usually reduced to clumps of dead stems. After checking in with a few mum-growing pros, I realized I was planting my mums too late. In fact, garden mums are fairly easy to grow, once you know the following mutual mistakes to avoid.

chrysanthemum blooming in a garden

Credit: William N. Hopkins

1. Ignoring the Type of Mum

Amy Enfield, a horticulturist for Phenomenon-Gro, says garden mums should be planted outdoors by late summertime or early fall, and so the roots take fourth dimension to form earlier the soil freezes. Also known as hardy or Belgian mums, garden mums are sold in garden centers and nurseries, and they're perennials in USDA Zones five to 9. But even when they're planted at the correct time, they need a few other things, similar excellent drainage. Enfield adds, "There'due south no guarantee they will survive the winter, particularly the farther northward you live in the U.Due south."

Florist mums, the kind sold in the houseplant section of your local grocery store, aren't meant to transplant at all, she explains. "Unlike garden mums, these are meant to abound within as indoor potted plants and are not cold hardy."

ii. Planting in Also Much Shade

Cynthia Drumgool, a potted plants and mums manager with Brawl Horticultural, says garden mums need full sunday or at to the lowest degree partial lord's day. One exception: in very hot climates, mums benefit from a piffling shade during the hottest part of the day. Otherwise, requite them plenty of lord's day for enough of blooms.

3. Over-fertilizing Your Plants

In spring, you tin can give your plants fertilizer with nitrogen when they're starting to grow leaves and branches. Merely don't fertilize once your mums form flower buds, says Enfield. In the fall, mums will benefit from a high-phosphorus fertilizer that promotes root development.

4. Forgetting to Water Mums

One of the biggest mistakes you can make with fall-planted mums, Enfield says, is declining to water them. "Days are cooler, the lord's day isn't as intense, and then plants, even those in containers, don't dry out as quickly. However, plants will continue to crave water until the ground freezes." While you may need to water daily in the summertime, after the weather cools downwardly, h2o only when the top inch of soil feels dry to the touch. Practice the same for potted indoor mums.

5. Cut Plants Back Besides Soon

Deadhead your garden mums in the fall, but go out the balance of the plant lone for as long as possible, Enfield advises. Mums apply their leaves to turn sunlight into energy for forming roots. Wait until the following bound to do any additional pruning, or until the stems die back to the ground. Then, cut the stems downward to about an inch or so above the ground earlier new growth appears.

vi. Pinching Mums As well Late (or Not at All)

If you don't pinch the growing tips of your garden mums, they'll flower, but you'll have plants with long stems and fewer flowers. "Pinching to remove flower buds helps encourage the constitute to branch and become fuller," Enfield says. "Stop pinching in early on July (no later than mid-July) and allow the buds to form and flowers."

vii. Not Improving Drainage

Mums won't thrive in soil that drains poorly and stays also soggy. That's especially true in cold-winter areas, says Enfield. If you take heavy clay or compacted soil, mix in some good-quality garden soil or compost to loosen it and improve the drainage in your planting site.

cutting chrysanthemum varieties in vases

Finally, go on in listen that the fall mums sold in garden centers nowadays aren't the same kinds of plants sold 20 years ago, Enfield says. Although garden mums are considered hardy to Zone five, breeders have developed fall mums with big mounds of showy flowers. This has resulted, she says, in plants that may non be as cold hardy equally in the by. So, if your fall-planted mums don't come dorsum like true perennials, but treat them similar annuals. Supersede them with beautiful, fresh plants when y'all're ready to exercise your fall decorating and bask their colorful blooms for a flavor.

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Source: https://www.bhg.com/gardening/flowers/perennials/fall-mum-mistakes/

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