Dead daffodils

azzabazza

My daffodils have been magnificent this year. I have spent a couple of hours dead heading those that have finished flowering.

An elderly gentleman walking his dog said, as he passed by my garden, that he always cuts about 2-3 inches off both the dead heads and the leaves rather than just dead heading. This is a new one on me. I always let the leaves die back naturally (not tied or anything else). Anyone heard of this method of dealing with daffodils after flowering?

browneyedbazzi

I know that some people do cut them back completely once they've flowered - I don't think it's something you need to do, but I don't think it does much harm and depending on your garden it might look nicer and give other (later) plants a bit more room. The lady who used to own my house was apparently a big fan of daffs as the borders are full of them. They looked nice for a few weeks but are dying back now - I'll be cutting them back significantly (and digging some of them up) because there are too many and will just look scruffy if left.

Farway

The RHS did a study, seems daff leaves need to be left at least 6 weeks to build up the bulb for the following year, the longer left the better

If you cut them off completely as soon as flowering is over they will eventually die out

tanith

Most gardeners advise leaviing leaves to die down naturally I've always done this and my daffs flower year after year,,

DaftyDuck

Cutting the tips off the leaves is meant to encourage the plant to stay upright and not flop. Supposedly, this stops the stem and bulb rotting if it's a damp Spring. Me, I never bother. I dead head those I see, and let the others grow seedheads. Daffs seem pretty resilient to me. You certainly should leave the leaves as long as possible, and certainly more than a month, otherwise the bulb won't bui;d up enough strength to flower the next year.

azzabazza

Thanks to all. Yes, I usually let the leaves die back naturally for a few weeks. I start planting bedding plants towards the end of May and when I am preparing the borders I usually remove all the daffodil remains then. Just wondered when the gentleman mentioned another method to me.

asset2004

tanith wrote: »

Most gardeners advise leaviing leaves to die down naturally I've always done this and my daffs flower year after year,,

That's what I do and mine are very good.
Our local council always cuts them back after they flower and guess what, there's not been any daffodils the last few years. There were a couple of green stalks but nothing this year.
Very sad as it was planted as a Marie Curie field of hope. I contacted the local parks dept to complain and they couldn't care less :mad:

themull1

Ive always cut the whole flower/leaves down to the ground as soon as they die off, since 1999, and always have lovely daffs, but then again, i take no notice of experts, prune when i feel like it, plant when i feel like it, and had nothing die yet!!

azzabazza

asset2004 wrote: »

That's what I do and mine are very good.
Our local council always cuts them back after they flower and guess what, there's not been any daffodils the last few years. There were a couple of green stalks but nothing this year.
Very sad as it was planted as a Marie Curie field of hope. I contacted the local parks dept to complain and they couldn't care less :mad:

Our local council leave cutting the grass around the daffodils for quite a few weeks after the flowers have faded.

meg72

I just love my daffs, 16 years ago I lived in a flat with just a small garden and an old neighbour advised me to plant my bulbs in pots and bury the pot in the border, when they finished flowering I lifted the pots out and left to die down, I planted dalias in the same size pot and just dropped in the hole in the autumn I lifted the dalias and put the pots of dafs back in, the dalias overwintered in a coldframe, did this for about 3 years and the beauty of it was when I came to leave I just transported my pots to the new house with a bigger garden and just put my daffs into open border, been here 12 years now and have a lovely show every year.