Pinching plants is more fun than deadheading
By Jimmy Williams
In any context, there’s a heap of difference between pinching and deadheading. Pinching is generally a lot more fun. At least it is to the pincher. The pinchee, whatever (or whoever) that might be, could disagree. And sometimes does, even violently.
In the case of "whoever," it could mean a slap up side the head of the perpetrator. In the case of "whatever" (and you could see this one coming, this being a garden column) the pinchee could just refuse to bloom for you that year if the pinching is inept and untimely.
Pinching, in our immediate context, is the act of nipping and shearing off new growth to force branching and increased numbers of blooms later. Deadheading has nothing to do with guillotines, here at least, and simply means the removal of spent blooms, often in the hope there will come more blossoms in a second flush.
Pinching is confined mostly to plants that bloom relatively late, from midsummer onward, while deadheading can (and should) be done any time old blooms reach the point of dereliction.
Chrysanthemums are the classic example of late-blooming perennials that are improved by timely pinching. New growth should be sheared back by half in May, June, and July to provide a bushy, heavily branched plant that will host hundreds, instead of dozens, of blooms. It is important with mums to feed them at each pinch. They are heavy feeders.
Commercially grown fall mums that often reach 2 feet across in a gallon pot are started as single cuttings as late as June, and you can see what regular pinching and feeding do for them. You can do the same thing in your garden, by taking the same pains with your mums.
Just about the earliest blooming plant that will benefit from pinching that I can think of offhand is larkspur. When the wee shoots grow to six inches, in April here, they can be pinched once, half way back. They will then branch into several stalks instead of one taller one. Larkspurs are blooming now.
Otherwise, the plants that lust for a good pinch are mostly mid-summer to fall performers. Besides the mums, there are Physostegia (obedient plant), asters, late sunflowers, goldenrods, heleniums, summer phlox, late perennial brown-eyed susans, salvias, butterfly weed, and even some woody plants that bloom on new wood (i.e. crape myrtles, butterfly bush, late hydrangeas).
It goes without saying that pinching should stop well before the plant’s scheduled bloom time, otherwise you’re cutting off potential flowers.
From Poor Willie’s Almanack— A good pinch never hurt anybody.