What to Know About Introducing Edible Mushrooms and Flower Pinching Techniques

Pinching is a type of pruning carried out to increase the number of blooms, keep plants shorter and more compact, and encourage consistent flowering times. The method is to pinch off the growing tip with your fingers once the seedling reaches the desired height. It is mainly used for herbaceous flowers. It is also used when pruning woody flower seedlings, as it encourages more side branches and gives the plant a more attractive shape later on. The method is to remove 1/3 or 1/2 of the growing tip once the seedling reaches about 10 cm, cutting at a point 0.5 cm above an axillary bud. It can be done multiple times as needed.

After the top of the main stem is pinched off (or cut off) on most flower seedlings, the plant's apical dominance shifts to the buds below the cut, and 3-4 branches grow out below the cut to replace the growth of the central main stem. Removing the front part of the central main stem before transplanting or planting out herbaceous flowers to encourage side branches is called the first pinching. If after some time the tips of each new side branch are pinched again, even more side branches will grow, and this is called the second pinching.

For common herbaceous flowers such as scarlet sage, snapdragon, ornamental pepper and Madagascar periwinkle, once the seedlings have established after planting out and reach about 10 cm in height, the tips can be pinched off to encourage more branching and more blooms. For others such as wax begonia, fuchsia and chrysanthemum, pinching should be done after the young plants have established from planting out, to encourage more side branches, a fuller shape and more flowers. However, for flowers whose blooms become smaller or fail to flower after pinching, such as garden balsam, cockscomb and China aster, pinching is not advisable.

Some single-stem woody flowering plants can be cut back at the base to change them into a bushy form. Examples include Chinese rose, osmanthus, wintercreeper euonymus, oleander and hibiscus. In some cases, the seedling is cut back once it reaches 20-30 cm in height, producing 3-4 side branches; then, once the side branches reach 10 cm in length, each side branch tip is cut back again, and before long a rounded plant with 9-12 side branches in a "three forks, nine tips" form is produced, as with rhododendron and gardenia.