[earthscape on]

how do you dead-head plants that have spent flowers but are still sending up new ones? (ex. gallardia, coreopsis)
do you shear it all off, or do you spend 2 hrs hand shearing each spent flower? Also, whats the best way of controllong field horsetail?

[BuenPatron]

Well, with those two plants you mentioned, we take 'em down to the foliar mass with the string trimmers.

'Twould be nice to cut off spent heads, but who wants to pay for that much time?

So, we sacrifice some flower heads for the sake of cleanliness, at least at our commercial properties. Some residentials are a little different.

[BuenPatron]

Oh yeah. The horsetail.
We mix glyphosate (cheap) with diquat (pricey), add a little soap and dye. We try not to use it too much, but as you know, horsetail just breaks off when ya pull it, just like it's brother, scouring rush.
The spray works well, but I cannot tell you which ingredient is responsible. Probably the diquat.

[Mark Oomkes]

Ditto to Buen for those plants, others individually.

Manage will work for over the top control very well. We tried it and it worked awesome. Finale will knock it back, but not necessarily kill it completely. Dyclomec\Casoron if you have woody type plants.

If that fails, I believe a nuclear detonation may eradicate it for good, but that might be debatable.

[earthscape on]

if i dont have a pesticide liscence, can i still get this from somewhere? whats the brand name? thanks

[phototropic1]

String trimmer? Yikes!!! I use a pair of shears for plants like that with a million blooms. I'm sure it takes longer than with a string trimmer, but it's still pretty fast.
You guys who use string trimmers....seems like the plants would be kinda mangled after that treatment. I'm thinking a good sharp blade is preferable.

[Fine Edge]

We use sharp hedge trimmers or hand pruners for most deadheading. From coreopsis to spirea to crape myrtles, it seems to give the best results.

[jon korevec]

I use a trimmer attacment in my stihl fs-85. it's got a pivoting head that really saves your back. $200 well spent IMO.
jon

[Mark Oomkes]

I should have clarified, (I have to stop doing 2 things at once, I can't handle it ) we use either a hedge shear on a trimmer shaft or shears. There are still quite a few that we do dead head by hand, just depends on how the customer wants to pay for it--either the right way or the wrong.

[familyguy]

i find it alittle humorous that earthscapes on has a little statement saying

"do the job right or don't do it at all" as he tries to find a shortcut.

The "right way"for deadheading is to hand prune them back to the next bud, lateral branch, or proper leaf break using a pair of hand snips.

The efficient way for deadheading when you simply can't spare that kind of time is sharp shears/hedge trimmers.

Be aware that like turf and mower blades, if you have an infected plant, the shears/hedge trimmer blades will carry that infection on to other plants a lot faster than hand snips will. (more tearing and wound entry ways)

[earthscape on]

when did i say i was trying to find a shortcut. i asked how to do it, so that i know how to do the job right...