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Staking and Training Perennials

The keys to a perennial garden's beauty lie largely unseen. Showy bloomers and striking foliage command attention, but well-amended soil, compost, mulch, and nutrients invisibly fuel the show. Similarly, stakes and supports create hidden infrastructure keeping a garden looking its best.

Reasons to Stake

Perennials lean, topple, and flop for various reasons. Rain and wind with weighty blooms bend stems. Overfertilizing causes lush, weak stems; established perennials thrive on limited fertilizer. Compost mulch in spring or annual organic fertilizer scratched in powers growth without weak stems.

Sun-loving plants in part shade stretch for sun, frequently requiring staking. Others flop due to large flower heads or lanky stems.

In nature, many perennials don't need staking because they lean on taller, stronger plants (grasses, shrubs, bushy perennials). Emulate nature's planting schemes or craft your own stake system.

How to Stake

Staking falls into preventive and remedial. Preventive: thoughtful planning before stems collapse for known floppers (peonies, meadow rue).

Choose stakes: grow-through supports for plants flopping before bloom (aster, boltonia, garden phlox, goldenrod). Use plastic-coated wire cages, tomato cages, or grids. Grid stakes offer sturdy support for heavy-headed bloomers and multistem perennials (peony, false indigo, Russian sage, tall daisies). Also use tree/shrub prunings, fallen branches, or Christmas tree boughs (after needles fall).

With preventive staking, insert supports in spring when plants emerge. Vital for grow-through and grid stakes. As plants grow, stems weave through stakes, absorbing them into the clump and hiding them.

Remedial staking is reactive—insert supports after perennials fall from high winds, downpours, etc. Keep materials on hand: twine, plant ties, bamboo stakes, single stakes, branched twigs.

Generally, support should fall between midpoint of plant height and peak growing point. Easy with remedial; with preventive, choose based on final plant height.

Unleash creativity: invent your own system with straight stakes, string, linking stakes, tomato cages, chicken wire, twine. Trial-and-error—what works for one perennial may work for another.

Tomato Cages

Versatile and inexpensive. Extra-large (3-4 feet) for tall bushy bloomers (Joe Pye weed, hollyhock, meadow rue). Medium (2-3 feet) for midrange perennials (peach-leaf bellflower, purple coneflower, Siberian iris). Transform into grow-through by wrapping twine across horizontal wires to form loose grid.

Use bolt cutters to customize: snip legs above hoops for varying height stakes. For perennials along fence/wall, clip cages at one spot on each hoop, open to form half-circle support.

Bamboo and Twine

Combine stakes and twine for custom supports adapted during season. Insert stakes early spring before plants need them; drive deep to anchor.

As stems emerge, tie twine around one stake, string to next, loop around, continue. Add string layers as stems grow. Keep tight enough to support but loose enough to avoid trussed look.

At season end, remove supports when cleaning up. Wooden/bamboo stakes rot; remove over winter. Dip ends in wax to slow deterioration.

Chicken Wire

Form cylinder slightly narrower than mature width of floppy perennial. Place against soil, anchor by weaving bamboo stakes through wire into soil. Great for bushlike perennials with thin stems (asters, baby's breath, helenium) or plants rabbits nibble.

Ways to Support Plants

As many ways as creative gardeners. Shown: commercially available and traditional techniques.

Grid

Flat circular grid with 3-4 legs; push legs in, snap ring in place; stems grow through grid. Use With: clump-forming perennials (peony, garden phlox, sea holly, monkshood).

Grow-Through

Flat circular support with concentric circles; 3-4 legs push into soil; stems grow through circles. Use With: multistem upright plants with thin stems (balloon flower, blanket flower, bugbane, helenium).

Linking

Upright pieces with arms that link and form bendable joints. Use With: any perennial that has flopped, overtakes less vigorous plants, or leans into a path (centranthus, crocosmia, pincushion flower, ladybells, Shasta daisy).

Mesh Cage

Form chicken wire cylinder slightly narrower than plant's mature width; place over perennial early; thread stakes through mesh; sink into soil. Use With: sprawling perennials (aster, blackberry lily, obedient plant, yarrow).

Other Plants

Position floppy perennials near stronger perennial/shrub neighbors; let stems lean on them. Use With: all perennials.

Single Stake

Use twine, hook-and-loop ties, or padded wire to bind stems to bamboo/wood stakes. Use With: tall perennials with heavy flower spikes (delphinium, foxglove, hollyhock, lily).