Lavender is a popular perennial to grow in home gardens, and one expert has shared a simple hack to encourage more flowers next year.
Lavender has become quite the trendy perennial to grow in your garden. Not only is it very drought-resistant, but lavender is also exceptionally easy to maintain.
The most crucial thing they need is a trim once their flowers finish for the year. Much like cutting grass, the trimming process promotes new bursts of fresh growth whilst maintaining the shrubs in an attractive, circular form.
Untrimmed lavender plants can become tangled, woody, and unappealing if they are left to grow wild.
This can even make them vulnerable to strong winds and disease problems.
Taking to her TikTok gardening page @anyathegardenfairy, Anya Lautenbach shared how she trims her lavender to “extend their life span” and “encourage more flowers” to flourish.
In the clip, Anya demonstrated how to cut your lavender back severely. She grabbed a ribbon and fastened it around the centre of her lavender plant before seizing a pair of scissors and snipping just beneath it.
She captioned the video: “I do this every summer because lavender should be pruned after flowering between late summer and autumn or in the springtime.”
Anya then went on to explain her reasoning for this. She said: “Pruning your plants correctly will prevent your plant from becoming woody, extend their lifespan, and it will encourage more flowers next year.
“Pruning your plants hard will result in bushy plants and more flowers the following year.
The key to pruning lavender is moderation. Avoid cutting too low into the woody stems, but also don’t just give it a light top prune.
Some gardeners may believe it’s too early to prune lavender, but delaying can lead to significant errors, reports the Express.
Postponing this task means that the plant will use its energy on setting seed rather than promoting new growth.
Early pruning allows the lavender to begin producing new growth while the weather is still pleasant and mild.