‘Correct’ method to deadhead a rose to ‘get more flowers’

A home gardener has shown how you should deadhead a rose to ‘get more flowers’.

Roses are one of the most popular flowers to grow in your garden as they are known for their beautiful red and pink colours but there are also orange, yellow and white roses as well. Red is the classic colour for this type of flower and is often associated with feelings of love.

Those who enjoy gardening might be keen to plant roses this spring but it’s also important to know what to do with roses that have finished blooming to encourage new growth. Sophie Valentine, who is “growing a family garden on a budget”, documents her home gardening journey on TikTok and also shares advice.

She recently posted a video about how to deadhead roses. David and Austin Roses explains on its website that deadheading is the “removal of finished blooms to encourage further blooms and improve the appearance and shape of the rose.”

Sophie said: “It’s really simple but you just wanna make sure you’re snipping it in the right place and then you’re gonna get more flowers and just like magic, we’ve got a perfect one to show you.

“So this flower has finished, there’s no other buds on this stem, so I don’t cut it back to where there’s three leaves, I cut it back to where there’s five leaves so we snip just there. Now remember that roses are repeat flowering so you will get more growth with more stems and more buds.”

Sophie then pointed to another rose that had lots of buds so she explained that it would be a case of “just snipping out the one stem that your rose is on.” She turned her attention to two flowers on the same stem.

One had finished but the other had more buds coming though so she didn’t want to cut it all the way back but instead, only cut it so that the rose with the dead parts came off. She found where the rose that had finished had come from, snipped that part of the step and caught the dead flower with her pliers.

Sophie added: “So that is done, that is now snipped.” Moving onto another rose, she continued: “The same with this, so when this one’s finished I will just snip that one bud but when all of them are finished you need to cut it back to where that first group of fives leaves are and then throughout the season you’re just gonna do it in the same way.”

David Austin Roses has also given some guidance on deadheading roses, similar to the method outlined by Sophie. It splits deadheading into two stages and for step 1 it states: “Pinch or cut off the finished flower, just below where the base of the flower joins the stem.

“Leave any remaining buds or blooms to continue flowering. Continue this as required throughout the flowering season.”

Its second step is to remove the entire flowering head by cutting the stem just above the first leaf with five leaflets. David Austin Roses adds: “Once all the flowering heads have been removed, cut any disproportionally tall stems back to the height of the rest of the plant, creating a neat rounded shape as you go.”

Sophie’s TikTok video has been well received by viewers. One user said: “This is so helpful! I’ve been doing it wrong to date.” Another commented: “First year with roses, this is very helpful.”