The Very Basics of Coneflower Care
Here’s how to easily care and maintain cornflowers in your garden!
Coneflowers are low-maintenance plants that brighten garden beds easily. They pair beautifully with other varieties like rudbeckia, salvia. and native grasses for an eye-catching display in your yard. To learn more about taking care of these beautiful plants, read on.
Planting
Coneflowers are easy-to-care-for perennial plants that bring vibrant hues to beds and borders with minimal effort on your part. According to this link, blooming throughout the summer, coneflowers attract bees and butterflies into your garden as bees visit to pollinate them! Once planted in their optimal location with enough sunlight, coneflowers will return year after year to add beauty and vibrancy to any landscape.
Dig a hole large enough to accommodate the coneflower’s entire root ball and position it inside, making sure that its surface is level with the surrounding soil. Tease out any roots necessary before backfilling with original soil, tamping down gently to avoid air bubbles.
Once planted, be sure to water your new coneflowers regularly over their first year for best results and to establish a deep root system. Subsequently, they only require approximately an inch of water each week unless experiencing drought conditions.
Watering
Coneflowers thrive in full sunlight and soil with good drainage, and once established, are generally drought-tolerant; however, for best results add additional water during dry spells to maintain consistent moisture.
Plants prefer their soil to remain at an optimal moisture level for extended periods; otherwise, it becomes overwatered and becomes susceptible to fungal disease. Therefore, water the planting hole or garden bed at least once every week using either a hose or watering can to provide enough liquid.
When planting coneflowers, dig a hole twice as large as their pot size and place the plant so its root ball rests level with the ground surface. If planting multiple plants at once, place each one 1 to 3 feet apart, depending on the anticipated maturity size; additionally, cover this area with a layer of compost or mulch to maintain constant soil moisture and prevent weed growth.
Fertilization
Coneflowers are moderate feeders that benefit from being fertilized with compost or well-rotted manure each spring, although too much fertilizer may lead to spindly growth and leggy plants. The best coneflower care is a light application of compost, as topdressing in spring should usually suffice – water immediately following fertilization to ensure nutrients are absorbed without overwatering! As summer progresses, reduce fertilizer applications to once every eight weeks so as to help your plants prepare for frost.
Echinaceas have proven themselves to be adaptable plants that thrive in diverse climates. From harsh winters and hot summers to relatively pest-resistant conditions, loamy or sandy soil with fast draining properties works best; however, they are adaptable enough to cope with rocky or clay soils if conditions allow it; in fact, they tolerate drought more readily than wet muddy conditions.
Once established, coneflowers require very minimal care. They typically do not need staking or support from being too close together, and they will reseed themselves often enough. When necessary, after three to four years to ensure health and vitality for continued blooming.
Pruning
Coneflowers are easy-care perennial plants with vibrant hues and forms, which attract bees and butterflies to your garden. Light pruning throughout the summer will promote flowering while also maintaining their appearance as neat plants.
As you prune your coneflowers, take special care to prune off spent blooms and dead leaves to promote more flowers being produced and prevent seed dispersion. Furthermore, cutting away spent flower heads helps prevent mildew or other fungal diseases that could otherwise wreak havoc on Echinacea plants.
Pruning coneflowers in the spring is essential to shaping their plant and encouraging its growth and blooms for years to come. In addition, early pruning allows the plant to recover from any winter damage it might have sustained; during the summer you should only prune off spent flowers and dead leaves from its plants.
Deadheading
Echinacea is a perennial flower that adds vibrant hues and textures to gardens. With a long blooming period and drought tolerance, Echinacea makes an excellent choice for sunny sites in various soil conditions. Plus, it attracts butterflies, making Echinacea cut flowers popular as well. Echinacea tea may help support immune systems.
Deadheading helps remove unsightly flower heads while also ridding the garden of excess seeds that would otherwise spread across it. While some gardeners opt to leave seed heads on coneflowers as food sources for birds in late winter and early spring, others choose to remove them as they look unsightly or can prevent receding next year.
To complete this task, use sharp pruning shears or scissors. Trace down each flower stem until you reach its base of the plant, ideally cutting just above its first set of leaves – at a quarter to half inch above any lower branching junctions where other flower stems emerge – in order to ensure no new blooms are lost during pruning. This ensures no new buds are sacrificed in this process.
