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Cutting back dill


How to Prune Dill for Summer Dishes, Drying, and Bushier Plants

Dill is among my favorite herbs I grow in my raised beds, not only because of the delicious harvest, but also because it’s a host plant for black swallowtail caterpillars. Every year they make an appearance! Because I grow so much—or rather, because I let so much dill go to seed—I don’t mind the caterpillars eating it because there is lots to go around. In this article, I’m going to share some tips on how to prune dill for bushier plants, to harvest for eating or drying, to delay flowering, and what to do with the seed heads.

Speaking of the seed heads, they are edible when dried, as are the flowers called umbels that look like yellow fireworks. Dill leaves, or fronds, can be eaten fresh or dried. If you’re looking in the spice aisle, dried dill is often called dill weed and can be used in everything from soups to stews. I love fresh dill in a summer salad.

Growing dill from seed

Dill is one of those herbs that dislikes having its roots disturbed, so it’s best to direct-sow seeds in the garden. You can sometimes find dill plants in pots at the garden center, but they may not take when planted.

Dill flowers are edible. Black swallowtail caterpillars, which rely on dill as one of their host plants, find them tasty, too!

If you’d like a continuous harvest, sow seeds from mid-spring (after all threat of frost has passed) to mid-summer in well-draining soil that gets at least six to eight hours of sunlight. If you let your plants go to seed as I do, keep an eye out in the spring for seedlings, and thin as necessary. Keep the area well weeded, so there are no competing plants. That said, my dill grows fairly well around some of the veggies I plant in my raised bed. And it makes a great companion plant for a few vegetables, like tomatoes, peppers and zucchini.

How to prune dill for bushier plants

It may seem counterintuitive to prune a plant that you’re trying to grow to eat, but most herbs benefit from a haircut.

If you use dill regularly, you may be able to skip this step because your frequent harvesting will achieve the same goal of encouraging a bushier plant and delaying blooms. Start pruning your dill when plants are about six to eight inches (15 to 20 centimeters) tall.

To prune, use a pair of herb scissors or even just a regular old pair of scissors and snip the frond-like leaves from the top of the plant, above a leaf set. A good general guideline that you can apply to any herb you’re pruning is to never trim more than one third of the entire plant. And also keep in mind that if you prune down a stem without leaving any fronds (or leaf sets), that stem will not grow more dill.

Be sure to eat whatever you prune off!

With dill, as with other herbs, like cilantro and basil, you also want to delay flowering. Pinching the flower buds can slightly postpone the flower heads from forming.

Anytime you prune even a small amount of dill, don’t let those tasty fronds go to waste! As you can see there is dill coming up throughout this garden because I let some of the seeds fall from the seed heads.

How to prune dill for recipes and drying

If you need some dill for a garnish or your favorite egg salad recipe, follow the same set of rules outlined above, always making sure you don’t trim down more than one third of the plant.

I snip longer fronds for dill pickles because whole sprigs are easier to fish out than small pieces. Longer stems will also make dill easier to hang and dry.

If you are going to snip dill for drying, keep an eye on the flower buds. The flavor is is strongest right before the plant flowers. Snip long stems and hang upside down in a dark, well-ventilated part of the house. I use gardening twine to hold the bouquet together and a curtain rod to hang. Once the leaves have dried out completely, store your dry dill in an airtight container in a dark cupboard.

I love to snip dill for both sweet and savory refrigerator pickles. I put the fronds in a jar with the garlic and other spices. Then I add the cucumbers and pickling liquid.

Once the herb starts to flower, the fronds aren’t as plentiful, or flavorful, for that matter. Slow-to-bolt varieties, like the All-America Selections winner Fernleaf Dill, can delay the flowers more than other types.

How to prune dill seed heads

Once those yellow dill flowers start to dry out, they’ll eventually form a TON of seeds. I like to let some fall in the garden, but I also save the seeds. If you’re not interested in your dill self-seeding, be sure to remove the seed heads. This article explains how to collect dill seeds for cooking or to plant next year.

One dill flower produces a LOT of seeds. Be prepared to do a lot of thinning if you don’t manage to snip your seed heads in time.

More herb-growing tips and advice

How to prune dill | Homes & Gardens

(Image credit: Getty images)

A favorite herb in the kitchen, dill is a gorgeous addition to salads and fish dishes. Knowing how to prune dill is essential for maintaining a healthy plant that will keep producing throughout the season. 

Dill has multiple culinary uses and is loved for its subtle aniseed taste. A staple in central and eastern European dishes, the delicate frothy leaves are a go-to herb for seasoning salmon and other fish dishes as well as being the standout flavor of dill pickles. Dill seeds on the other hand are a popular constituent of Indian cuisine as well as infusing in soups and stews. You can even use the pretty yellow flowers as a garnish for salads.

Once you know the basics of how to grow dill, you need on to move on to pruning it – we tell you how in this helpful guide.

(Image credit: Unsplash)

Dill is very easy to grow but is an annual plant. This means it completes its entire life-cycle, from germination to setting seed, in a single year. Plus, dill also has a reputation for dying quickly after producing its seeds. 

Therefore, lengthening the lifecycle of this fast growing herb is essential for its longevity and knowing how to prune dill correctly is key. Cutting the herb regularly will increase its yield by making the plant bushier as well as delaying the development of flowers and seeds.

(Image credit: Getty images)

How to prune dill: step-by-step

Pruning dill starts when the plant is still small, once its got around five leaves – somewhere between four and eight weeks after planting.

  1.  Start by pinching the growing tips to encourage a bushier plant. The bushier the plant, the more stems and leaves it has and so more available to harvest.
  2. At this point you can also cut any longer stems so that all the stems are the same length and the plant has an aesthetically pleasing appearance.
  3. Be sure to use sharp secateurs or scissors to prevent your pruning from damaging the plant.
  4. It is important to then leave the plant to recover and return to its previous size as this will ensure that your plant does not die due to over-pruning.
  5. Then harvest the dill plant when required for culinary or aesthetic reasons. Little and often is a good approach. 'Cut the leaves at the point they join stem or cut the stem within a few inches of the ground, discarding the thick, tough stems,' says Dan Drost in research for Utah State University .
  6. 'Pinch off the flower buds if you are growing dill for its foliage; the flavor will be most intense before the plant blooms,' says Kristin Winterbottom from Park Seeds . Doing this will extend the life of the plant and as a result ensure you are able to continue harvesting the herbs. 
  7. If you are growing your dill plant for seeds, then you will want to allow the dill plant to flower. You can achieve this by pruning the leaves but leaving the main stems and growing tips intact. 
  8. 'To harvest the seeds, secure a paper bag over the flowerhead as the blooms begin to pass. Shake the stem of the plant every so often; when the bag rattles, it is full of dill seeds,' continues Winterbottom.
  9. 'If you’re not interested in seeds, cut off entire plants for preserving either in oil or in the freezer just before flowers open,' advises Amy Enfield, Horticulturist for Bonnie Plants . This will ensure you have delicious dill ready to go all-year round.

(Image credit: Getty images)

How do I prune back dill?

You prune back dill by 'snipping back the foliage fronds continuously but lightly to encourage healthy growth and prevent flowering. Try not to damage the stems or leaves by using sharp pruning shears,' advises Gena Lorainne from landscaping experts Fantastic Services .

(Image credit: Getty Images)

How do you cut fresh dill so it keeps growing?

To cut fresh dill so that it keeps growing, you must never cut back more than a third of the plant and be sure to leave enough time for the plant to recover after pruning. This will ensure that the dill is able to regrow after having been cut back.

(Image credit: Getty images)

How to prune dill for floral arrangements

Dill also makes a beautiful addition to cut flower arrangements. For this, the method for how to prune dill is slightly different. Therefore, if you want to grow dill for both floral arrangements and culinary use, it is worth growing separate plants.

Avoid pruning the growth tips of the plant so that it can continue to grow and flower. You need to wait until the plant has just started to flower, then cut the stems near the base at bouquet length. 'As a cut flower, it's good with whites and blues or rich, brilliant colors to heighten their contrasts,' suggests plantwoman Sarah Raven . 'The flowers last a few days in a vase'.

(Image credit: Getty images)

This feature was created by H&G sister brand, Period Living magazine

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Period Living is the UK's best-selling period homes magazine. A subscription provides you with all you need to know about caring for and improving a traditional house and garden

Having graduated with a first class degree in English Literature four years ago, Holly started her career as a features writer and sub-editor at Period Living magazine, Homes & Gardens' sister title. Working on Period Living brought with it insight into the complexities of owning and caring for period homes, from interior decorating through to choosing the right windows and the challenges of extending. This has led to a passion for traditional interiors, particularly the country-look. Writing for the Homes & Gardens website as a content editor, alongside regular features for Period Living and Country Homes & Interiors magazines, has enabled her to broaden her writing to incorporate her interests in gardening, wildlife and nature. 

cutting rules for different varieties in 2022 at GoodGrunt

Contents


Not everyone knows what is the best thing to do when growing herbs - cut dill and wait for the branches to grow back, or uproot it. You can do this and that. Each gardener makes a choice based on his needs and the characteristics of the dill variety.

When is the best time to pluck and when to cut?

Dill cultivars differ in rosette shape, bush height, stem formation and flowering time.

Early maturing greens are ready for cutting after 35 days from emergence. These are varieties such as:

The listed varieties produce a flower stalk early and are suitable for obtaining fresh greens in a short time. In the future, the "umbrellas" of these plants can be used for conservation, but you will no longer get lush greenery from them.

You can cut off young branches from them and leave the bush if you still need umbrella inflorescences that will be used for harvesting for the winter. Otherwise, it is better to uproot the plant and sow it again. During the season in the climate of the middle lane, you can sow dill 3 times. This culture is unpretentious and grows well even in autumn.

There are also varieties with late peduncle formation and abundant foliage growth, for example:

Sowing this dill in the spring, you can cut greens from it for a long time and in large volumes. Its leaves do not lose their urgent tenderness and aroma. Surplus can be dried for the winter. You can cut such dill several times, so it makes no sense to pull it out after cutting it for the first time.

Long-term left in the garden and late varieties:

Umbrellas appear on them only towards the end of summer. The 20 bushes planted on the plot are more than enough to provide the family with fresh greenery in the summer months. If the summer is cold, the plants may not set seeds at all.

How to cut correctly?

After sowing in the ground, dill usually grows too densely, and at first young bushes are taken on the greens, thinning out.

It is necessary to cut the greens from the left bushes correctly.

  1. First of all, cut off the lower tier of branches - the bush will still grow.
  2. After that, the lateral axillary shoots are plucked out. You need to cut the dill as needed, for example, for serving or preparing a salad.
  3. After the top of the bush grows, it is also used for cutting.

It is important to know that bush cultivars show their characteristics only when there is sufficient feeding area, therefore, after thinning, the distance between plants should be at least 20 cm with a row spacing of 25–30 cm. With this planting scheme, fresh leaves from each plant can be cut into for 40–45 days.

So, by choosing the right variety of dill and planting it in suitable conditions, you can cut branches from one plant within 1.5 months. They pull out a bush with roots only when planting early varieties. In this case, it is recommended to sow the seeds not at the same time, but with a difference of 1-2 weeks.

How to collect

correctly so that it ripens more than once, will there be new grass later, can it be uprooted?

Dill is a tasty and healthy herb. But in order for it to show all its advantages as a seasoning and as a means of traditional medicine, it must be properly assembled. And for this you need to know some basic points, without taking into account which the yield will be less. Let's figure out what kind of yield you need to count on, how to collect it correctly, what you need to have at hand.

  1. What is the yield of a crop and what does it depend on?
  2. When is it usually torn, so that later collection is also possible?
  3. How to understand that the greens are ready for harvest?
  4. What happens if the deadline is missed?
  5. Does the spice keep growing back after cutting it?
  6. Trim, cut off or pull out with roots - what to choose?
  7. Can it be cleaned multiple times?
  8. What time of day and what weather is best?
  9. How and when to cut off so that new greens ripen further?
    1. On a garden bed in open ground
    2. in the greenhouse
    3. At home
  10. How and when to collect seeds?
  11. Mistakes and how to avoid them
  12. Useful video

What is the crop yield and what does it depend on?

Dill yield is usually:

However, these are average figures. The actual yield depends on the following factors:

  1. Growing conditions. Dill is a very light-loving crop. With insufficient lighting, it will grow poorly and will not gain green mass. In areas of the same soil, but with different illumination, dill will give more greenery where there is more sun.
  2. For all its unpretentiousness, this culture is very responsive to the structure and composition of the soil. The largest yields are obtained on light, loose soil with a sufficient thickness of the humus layer.
  3. Fertilizers applied. Like all crops grown for greens, dill is responsive to nitrogen fertilization - from organics (compost, grassroots peat, manure in the fall) to synthetics (nitrate and azofoska).
  4. Humidification. Dill needs more moisture than most crops. And if watering is insufficient, there is no need to wait for a large yield, the greens will not grow lush.
  5. Grade. and hybrids from nurseries give a greater yield than a handful of seeds in the grandfather's garden, collected in the fall. However, it is important to take into account regionalization: if a variety is not suitable for a particular area, record yields cannot be expected from it.

Important!

The numbers on the packaging of dill seeds are usually not to be trusted. Even the best variety will not show its outstanding qualities if the conditions are not suitable.

On the contrary, if you are lucky with the soil, moisture and sun, even a handful of seeds collected from semi-wild volunteer dill will provide the gardener with a record harvest.

When is it usually vomited so that collection is also possible later?

Harvesting takes place in two stages:

  1. For current needs - after the bushes reach a height of 15-20 cm. From now on, you can collect greens from them for salads, soups and other dishes that are cooked immediately same. At this stage, the greens are not stored.
  2. Stored. This phase lasts until flower stalks have formed.
  3. Technical dill (used, among other things, for pickling and preserving vegetables) - from the formation of peduncles to the milky ripeness of seeds.
  4. - after reaching the full maturity of the plant.

In terms of time, it looks like this:

All times are, of course, indicative. Real harvesting should begin when biological maturity is reached.

How do you know when your greens are ready to be harvested?

According to biological characteristics, you should be guided by the following:

  1. Young dill for greens can be cut from the moment 5-7 pairs of true leaves appear. However, at this stage it is better to cut one or two leaves per plant.
  2. Mass collection for greens - after the plants reach a height of at least 15 cm (for late-ripening varieties - at a height of 20-25 cm). Here you can cut the whole plant.
  3. Collection for seeds - when at least 2/3 of the umbrella is yellowing.

Attention!

For personal use, dill is also suitable, obtained at the stage of tearing up the beds, when excess plants are removed. This is not a commercial green, but it is great in a salad or soup.

What happens if the deadline is missed?

If harvesting deadlines are missed, the following consequences are possible:

However, in general, the consequences of "overgrowing" dill are less than from immaturity. Therefore, if you are in doubt whether it is time to harvest the dill, then let it stand for another 5-7 days.

Does the spice keep growing back after cutting it?

One of the main advantages of herbaceous plants as a spice is their ability to regrow from the root. This also applies to dill: being cut at the root, it is able to start growing again before the end of the season and, if the weather permits, reach full maturity again.

In the south, where the warm season lasts a long time, it is even possible to harvest seeds from those plants that have already been cut (which is highly discouraged in the north - that is, throughout Russia north of the Kuban). You also need to take into account dill varieties:

Tip

On average, after cutting, a bush grows back in 15-25 days, depending on the variety. If, however, the dill is not cut at the root, but limited to the removal of extreme branches and leaves, then harvesting can be carried out almost continuously after ripening.

Trim, pluck or uproot – which one to choose?

For personal purposes, you can pick bushes and twigs, but for mass harvesting or selling, dill must be cut, minimally injuring the root. Uprooting makes sense only when the greens are planted in the wrong place.

Can I clean several times?

Not only possible, but necessary. If the variety is suitable, greens can be removed from it within one and a half to two months after germination. A bush is pulled out with roots only in the following cases:

What time of day and what weather is best?

Dill is best harvested:

It is best to harvest in dry, clear weather (if the greens will be used right now) or in overcast, damp, but not rainy weather - if you plan to dry the dill for storage.

For sale, dill is cut on a dry morning, after the dew has evaporated, but before the sun has begun to "roast" the stems. At this time, dill has the maximum commercial qualities.

How and when to cut off so that new greens ripen further?

In the garden in the open field

To collect dill in the garden you will need:

Harvesting is done as follows:

  1. The bush is cut off, leaving a stem stump and a couple of leaves.
  2. The cut is powdered with a pinch of ash.
  3. Cut greens are placed in a container and carried away for sorting and harvesting (drying, freezing, salting, etc. ).

Important!

On very large areas, measured in acres and hectares, you can use a trimmer or brushcutter for cleaning. However, in general, this is undesirable, since it severely injures plants.

Next, you can watch a video on how to properly cut dill in the open field:

In the greenhouse

In the greenhouse, greens are harvested in the same way as in the open air. However, due to the smaller area, one should pay more attention to the condition of dill bushes, cutting off only those that are completely healthy and do not have yellowed and reddened branches.

At home

If dill is grown on a windowsill, harvesting can be carried out in the same way as in the open air or in a greenhouse, that is, by cutting. However, , due to the smaller volume, you can not cut the greens, but pluck.

This option is even better for the development of dill, because it leaves not a “stump”, but a stump jammed inside with minimal oozing.

How and when to collect seeds?

First of all, you need to focus on the maturity of the umbrellas. There are two possible errors here:

  1. Seeds are collected immature - and then they will not sprout, and when treated they will not have the desired effect.
  2. Umbrellas are overripe - and most of the seeds have already crumbled. Considering that the dill seed is very light, it will not work to collect the seeds from the soil later, but they themselves will sprout in the most unexpected places. Sometimes this is useful, but more often the dill that has crawled out in the garden will only interfere with growing other crops.

When assembled correctly, the following must be taken into account:

Attention!

Seeds should be collected when the dill umbel has turned about 2/3 yellow. This is the best option: the umbrella has not yet crumbled, but most of the seeds are already ready for collection.

Collection is carried out on a calm day (seeds are very light, easily break out and fly off anywhere in the wind), preferably before 11 o'clock in the afternoon.

Seeds are harvested as follows:

  1. An umbrella and about 2-3 cm of stem are carefully cut off from each dill bush with scissors.
  2. Each umbrella is placed in a paper or woven bag.
  3. Packages with umbrellas are sent for final drying within 5-7 days. It is necessary to dry in a dry, ventilated area, without removing it from the bags.
  4. After drying, the bags are opened, the umbrellas are taken out, the seeds are poured into the prepared container.
  5. If seeds remain on the umbrellas, they are threshed.

Threshing can be carried out in several ways:

  1. A newspaper or a large sheet of paper is placed on the table, then with light blows on it, the seeds are knocked off from the umbrella.
  2. An umbrella is placed on a newspaper, covered with a second one, and gently rolled with a rolling pin with light pressure.

After threshing, the seeds should be sieved on a sieve, and preferably on two: fragments of an umbrella will remain on a large-holeed one, dust and dust will come off on a small one, but the seeds will remain. Ready seeds can be stored.

The video below shows the process of collecting dill seeds:

Mistakes and how to avoid them

The main mistakes in collecting dill are:

Advice

Avoiding mistakes is easy - you need to observe the degree of development of plants, removing greenery in time.

Harvesting dill, carried out on time, will provide the gardener with a mass of tasty and healthy herbs. But in order for the spice not to lose commercial qualities, it is necessary to monitor how mature the plants are for harvesting.

Useful video

The following video, using the example of dill grown in a greenhouse, shows how to understand whether you can cut the greens for a re-harvest or do it too late:

Read more:

When to harvest sorrel and how to cut it? Factors affecting ripening, storage methods and more

What is the right way to harvest fragrant basil, when is the best time to do it?

How to grow a rich crop of dill? Features of bush varieties

When to remove green radish from the garden, so that the vegetable retains its valuable composition and commercial qualities? Useful tips

A popular variety of dill is the Alligator.

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