Gardening with Gary

Gardening Advice from an Expert

Impatiens

Nancy writes~ My daughter planted an Impatiens for me last year in kindergarten and much to my amazement it thrived all winter. It grew too large for the tiny pot it was in, so I just repotted it. Now, the stems are getting quite long, with most of the foliage and flowers near the ends of the stems. The rest of the stem is bare. Am I supposed to be cutting this back or just leaving it grow? If I cut it back, how far? If I continue to grow it in a pot how big can it get? I've only seen impatiens grown outside.

A. Nice to hear from you and of your success. I bet your child will enjoy the growing of her plant! You need to trim it back. I imagine that it has stretched throughout the low light of the winter and now that spring has sprung, the light will increase and the health will improve.

Do you plan on keeping it indoors? They love the outdoors, so please consider planting it in a semi-shady location where it will not get the heat of the day, but a couple hours of sun light, as 10-Noon or 3-6 PM. Avoid the midday.

Watch the watering, as they are heavy drinkers. Their stems are practically all water, so when dry, they hang down quickly but will recover if you water ASAP.

Feed them every two weeks with a general gardening food. They will grow to about 2' tall and stay shorter if you pinch them back an inch or two throughout the summer. This will increase branching and produce more flowers.

Cut the stems back to about 6". If that leaves no foliage, make sure it has good light to force the buds to break and send out new growth. You can take these cut stems and trim off the bottom leaves. Place them in a glass of water in a windowsill and watch them root! Your daughter will get a huge kick out of that. Change the water weekly to avoid browning and disease. Pot them up or plant into the garden with the other one after the roots reach about 4" in length. Soon, you will have several plants which will grow and bloom all the way until fall.

You can dig up the plants, cut them way back, pot up into 5" plastic pots, and take indoors for the winter.