I cut my Purple Smoke Baptisia back to about 15 inches immediately after blooming this year. It has regrown to almost its original height and is perfect looking, with no flopping at all. Mine has always had a tendancy to splay open and flop somewhat after blooming, so I have been cutting it back some each year, but I never gave it such a drastic haircut until this year. Worked fine. Nice, bushy, upright & about the prettiest cleanest foliage of anything this time of year. Took surprisingly little time to regenerate itself, but as I said before, did not get quite as tall as it was originally. The problem that I had in previous years was that with a minor haircut it got even taller with regrowth than it was originally, somewhat out of proportion with other plantings in the bed, & still splayed open more than I liked. My baptisia is planted in amended rich fertile clay soil in an area that is somewhat high in my yard & on the dryish side (for my wettish garden). In less rich soil it might not need such drastic cutback treatment, but it was this or dig it out. BTW, it looked a lot like asparagus spears sticking out of the ground after I gave it the hard cutback, kind of ugly & scary looking, but I'm very happy with it now. Now it is sort of the perfect late summer/early fall plant that also managed to look good in spring & early summer - a very long season!

Baptisia are slow growing and long-lived plants. I bought 3 last November that were "fall bargain" plants. Got 2 of the hybrid Twilight Prairie Blues and 1 Carolina Moonlight for $5 apiece! Planted them in my "xeric" garden, where the drought-tolerant plants are going. The soil is sandy loam, well-drained. It is sunny spot that tends to dry out. I did spread a little compost and water them well to get established. They bloomed well, although I expect they'll be much bigger next year. The Prairie Twilight Blues is a purply-maroon color with a little yellow - hard to describe, but truly exquisite. The Carolina Moonlight is a soft yellow. I tried to take pictures, but couldn't get shots that came close to their beauty in real life. There's alway next year. Perhaps you planted them in a bed that is too rich - which encouraged foliage but not blooms?

I am so jealous!! Mine just started poking its head up a few days ago and are even smaller then the one in your picture! I think I have blue and twilight prarie varieties planted and I have yet to see false indigo blooms in person but the foliage is very nice in my opinion! Hopefully I will see some blooms this year :) ~michael

I have False blue indigo and Carolina lupine growing very close to each other. Can I move one? If so, which and how?