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newbie: when to cut back foliage

ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5

13 years ago

it is often asked when is the proper time ...

its never too late .. so no need to hurry ...

so the question is.. what is too early ...

well.. all that brown gunk is actually a sort of mulch.. protecting the crown and buds below .. as well as keeping the soil cold.. retarding the breaking of dormancy ...

up here in z5.. that is all a plus .. since my last frost date is 6/1 ..

if i run out there today ... BECAUSE I HAVE THE FEVER ... and we have a warm spring.. those plants can become overly active and start growing in an active phase ... and i have near 60 plus days of POSSIBLE deep frost or freeze ... some plants will not react positively to such ... they might survive if it happens once.. but if it happens 2 or 3 times.. most plants are going to be really pissed off... and probably die ... [this is also one of the reason i NEVER fertilize too early .. i dont want fast early lush growth ]

now.. sooner or later.. you will 'see' that the plants are awakening naturally ... and that is probably the best time to start cutting back ... because you can not.. at that time.. blame yourself for allowing the plants to come out early ...

make sense ...

and keep in mind .. since you are a newbie .. that peeps down south.. are months ahead of us in the great white north.. and what they can do right now [get away with ] .. is not really relevant to what you should be doing ...

hope greegandamy see this as they triggered the post ... let me know ..

all you non-newbies... what did i forget.. miss.. what wisdom can you add ...

and never forget.. what some of us 20 .. 30.. 40 year gardeners.. can ad do get away.. with a lot of things that technically are wrong ... but then.. we have no fear of we kill a bunch of stuff .... though you may be upset at the loss.. we consider it an opportunity to try to kill something else .. lol ...

now go take a pill and dont go out there trying to kill everything.. because you have the fever ... that is your problem.. not your plants ...

ken

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Comments (6)

mustard_seeds
13 years ago
Thank you! I am satisfying some spring fever by getting some extra mulch collected from the compost center... great to be out in the mud, but not "cleaning up"
rj56
13 years ago
Oops, I saw some of my grasses had sent up some green shoots, along with my anemones, so I trimmed the grasses and gathered some leaves. I had the fever.
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mxk3 z5b_MI
13 years ago
No ooops - the plants will be fine.
hostaholic2 z 4, MN
13 years ago
Several feet of snow still covering my beds helps to keep those clean-up urges in check. LOL
ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
Original Author
12 years ago
another bump up ...

i believe it speaks for itself.. anything to add???

ken

Here is a link that might be useful: there are a bunch of other newbie posts that i created over the years.. but i am not going to bump them all up myself .... but you can ... old posts do not hang in GW forever.. unless they are bumped every now and then ...
kentstar
12 years ago
Well said Ken! lmao! And so true! Sit back and enjoy the time you have left to do nothing because pretty soon you'll have way too much to do and wish you could be sittin' back!

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