Published Saturday, July 5, 2008
Beautiful garden just needs a little discipline, nurturing
Everyone knows that the right combination of discipline and nurture is key to raising a happy, healthy child. These two often-contradictory factors play a big part in a beautiful, flourishing garden as well. While the nurture of food and water is well known to most folks, the discipline part is often misunderstood.
Whether you're dealing with vegetables, perennial flowers or annuals, all of these require attention to keep fruit and blooms coming at a fast clip. Mechanisms within the plants tell them when to start flowering in spring and stop producing in late summer or fall. If we can thwart the "stop" mechanism, we can get plants to think it's still spring and continue forming new buds.
The stop mechanism is seed production, which begins with the flower's fading. This can happen in just a few days with fast-growing French marigolds, for example.
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In the vegetable garden, the maturation of fruit beyond its peak tells those plants it's time to slow down. For example, a zucchini that reaches mammoth proportions on the plant contains nearly mature seeds. Allowing this would kick in the stop mechanism, causing the plant to quit making new flowers.
If you promptly pick your squash or other food crops while the fruit is still young and tender — which may be every day — this discipline will drive a much larger and longer harvest. Cutting faded flowers is equally effective at stimulating new buds. In fact, cutting flowers before they fade to use indoors is just as valuable.
This kind of disciplinary action is one of the most enjoyable tasks for a gardener. When you venture out in the early morning or at dusk, when the sun dips below the horizon and the air is balmy, you avoid the heat and sweat that makes midsummer plant care so uncomfortable. Armed with a pair of clippers and a bucket, roam around your garden looking for those not-too-fresh flowers and nip them off. Harvest all the vegetables that are ready to eat and store the excess in the refrigerator. You'll find your bliss in this simple act.
At wholesale grower Monrovia Nursery, based in Azusa, Calif., the workers diligently spend their days manicuring plants. They aren't just armed with standard pruners, they also carry a wickedly sharp flower shear or "snip." The long, pointed blades are shaped like needle-nose pliers and are designed for light detail work.
These were first used by the cut-flower industry and also by bonsai aficionados to allow access to a plant's tiny nooks and crannies. They'll allow you to manicure your smaller annuals, reaching in to snip off dead flowers. You can also harvest your tomatoes with the stems intact for better storage, severing them cleanly without damaging nearby leaves or flowers.
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You will find flower shears at most home-improvement stores and garden centers. Those from name-brand companies will last decades. Because the blades are so long and thin, poor-quality tools may bend or break under long-term use. Good steel holds up and may be repeatedly sharpened. Among the most reliable brands are the Corona Thinning Shear and the Felco Fruit and Vegetable Harvesting Shear.
Some perennials require a slightly different regime. These tend to produce their flowers over shorter periods of weeks to a month, then cease production. Since most of the flowers fade about the same time, cut them back all at once. During the summer, nurture the plant to encourage new stem, leaf and root growth. You may be rewarded by a more modest second flowering in the fall.
Diligent attention to the status of fruit and flowers is essential for a high-producing garden. It also gives you time to go out and wander about your plants, applying a gentle discipline that helps them produce more abundantly and far longer than ever before.
Maureen Gilmer is a horticulturist and host of "Weekend Gardening" on DIY Network. Contact her at her Web site www.moplants.com or visit www.diynetwork.com.
