How To Get Your Flower Cutting Garden Up and Running

I know that you can always drive down to the corner store to buy fresh cut flowers, but with a little planning you don’t have to go that far or pay that sort of money. Garden bouquets have more personality than their store-purchased cousins and there’s nothing like a vase of fresh, fragrant flowers to brighten up a bad day at home or at work. We’ll explain how to reserve a corner of your garden for growing flowers to be cut into beautiful bouquets.

Having a bad day? Stepping into your garden and bringing back a delicate bouquet to put on the kitchen table or your work desk is always an easy way to cheer up. A garden bouquet has charm and softness, the little imperfections and variations in size give the bouquet its appeal. It’s like comparing home-made cookies to store-bought ones. Except that unlike home-made cookies, your cuttings are available whenever you want them.

A cutting garden can easily be planned and cared for by selecting a corner of one of your flower beds. Some annual and perennial varieties such as Purple Coneflower, French Marigolds or Zinnias are better suited for cutting but when planting from seed, be sure to include some ornamental grasses that will offset the flowers in the bouquets.

To begin planning your cutting garden, first decide on the type of flowers you want; pay attention to color and blooming cycles. Be sure to include repeat-blooming annuals and perennials in order to get lots of flowers in a season, and limit the varieties to a maximum of three or four that will look good together. Remember that the flowers have to look as good indoors as they do outdoors so include a flower that has long, sturdy stem and a bloom that will look good for several days, such as bright orange French Marigolds, or white Shasta daisies.

The location of your cutting garden is important too: choose the sunniest area of a flower bed with soil that is moist, but not wet. A good soil mixture is sand, silt, and clay in equal proportions mixed with some organic fertilizer. Or, you can try growing the flowers in containers and placing them in a sunny spot.

Cutting the flowers themselves is actually a form of pruning. It can extend the blooming cycle of many annuals and some perennials, but try not to over-cut ornamental shrubs as this can cause poor growth the following season. Cut flowers in the morning using a sharp knife or secateurs and put them straight into a bucket of lukewarm water to prevent the stems from sealing over and shortening the lifespan of the cut flowers. Then strip the leaves from the bottom of the stem. Leave the bucket in a cool place for a few hours before bringing the cut flowers into the home -- and enjoying them!