The stalks are probably brown now, but the foliage should still be green. You can leave the stalks in place and they will drop seed over time. Or you can cut the stalks and let the seed heads dry a few weeks, then save the seed and either sow it next winter or Spring, or scatter it this fall where you'd like to have more plants next year. You might even be able to start the seed now - for next year's blooms.

Digitalis purpurea is a biennial but if you let it go to seed each year, or sow it yourself in pots, then you will have blooms every year on the 2nd year plants. So it will appear to be perennial.

Sometimes the plants will come back and bloom for a 3rd year, especially if you deadhead.

emptysgirl7
NO, it will not be perennial. Not the same plant. They all will be biennial. You either misinterpreted something or you were wrongly informed.

Hello again, I just looked at the foxglove and everything including the foliage is brown nothing on it is green. So should I cut it down or leave it alone and since it is a biennial that means it won't return until the year after next right.

A biennial generally only lives for two years. It grows foliage the first year and flowers and dies the second year. If allowed to go to seed, you may get seedlings the second year (in late summer to fall) and then those seedlings may flower the 3rd year. In this sense, the plant may seem *perennial* in that it persists in the garden, but it is through new plants each year, similar to how an annual may reseed in your garden.

To confuse matters more, some individual biennial plants may live for more than two years, especially if they are NOT allowed to go to seed. Many plants, once they produce seeds, have a change in the hormones produced. After producing seeds it may signal the plant to stop growing, since the next generation has been assured. :)

Additionally, many biennals are now being bred to flower the first year. I know there are foxglove and sweet william varieties that can flower in approx. 4 months from seed, without the winter cold period most biennials need.

If your foxgloves are brown and dried up, I would cut off the dry parts. You may get a new flush of foliage from the base and they may even flower next year. Sometimes when I cut down my foxgloves in late spring they send out new flowers the same year. In order to be most assured of having foxgloves next spring, you can start seeds inside or on a sheltered porch NOW. Transplant them to the garden by beginning of Oct (they will just be little seedlings). Next spring they will hopefully flower for you.

Good luck and happy gardening.