Poor regrowth from Salvia Nemarosa Caradonna

CraighB

Hi guys,

I have a Salvia Nemorosa Caradonna in a container and I purchased it earlier this year and it had lovely long thick stems with lots of flowers. After flowering I pruned the plant back by about half following advice I read on many difference websites and apparently side shoots would come and I would get more flowers.

Well I did this in June and the plant has very very slowly produced side shoots but they are very very thin and there are hardly any flowers at all at the end of them.

Should I be doing something else? How do others prune the same salvia after its first flowering?

Thanks

Craigh

Borderline

I think they are over-rated myself. They don't repeat flower well, and as you say, the second flush is not worth the cutting down in June. Not sure about cutting 'half', I prune down to the leaf areas and some further down. Either way, done light cut and heavy cut over last 2 years and still doesn't repeat flower well.

RaspberryKiller

I've had the exact same issue... Posted about it a week ago.

The flowering is weak and the colour fades quickly. The plants seem  to be giving up on flowering now, and one has stopped altogether.

The plant itself, however, is very green and healthy. I wonder if they're putting in far too energy into the foliage with not enough left for flowering... Mine are growing like crazy.

Nollie

I agree, I don’t think they are all they are cracked up to be either. I planted lots, liking the look of the long, deep purple spires, but they do fade quickly and are slow to reflower, so their impact as a border plant is, for me, underwhelming. I cut each individual stem down to its base, I would think cutting the whole plant back by half would check them too much.

I wonder if there is a longer-lasting nemorosa with a bit more oomph?

CraighB

Im glad it's not just me then! It does look an amazing plant however I think it will have to be treated like poppies in the fact that they flower for a short period and that's them done for the year. I also wonder Nollie if there is a longer lasting Nemorosa? 

floralies

The same problem here, I thought they would give a much better show. I also have Nemorosa Amethyst. Both have been deadheaded regularly but are slow to send up new flower spikes, if at all.

ForTheBees

I've a Nemorosa Salvation Rose that I planted at the start of June just to coincide with the drought. I deadhead the flowers just to the next branching point. Despite me watering and feeding it, it was fairly slow to show much growth. However as soon as the rain returned it's woken up. The small number flower stem stubs that had started to appear suddenly grew really quickly and flowered, and it's now covered in a lot of new flower stubs. I'm hoping that means I'll get a decent late August/early September show.

Nollie

I’ve had lots of rain, storms every afternoon for a couple of weeks, but hasn’t made any difference to mine, but glad yours is doing well, ForTheBees. Any recommendations out there for a nemorosa to best Caradonna? Purple is my thing, by the way. Just saying.

ForTheBees

I might yet have jinxed it! If I remember I'll post an update.

ForTheBees

So this is size of my second flowering as of this morning.

CraighB

That looks great! I won't even post a photo of mine lol it looks in a right sorry state haha