Thinning the Scilla

One thing about perennials is that in the spring many of them need to be thinned in order to keep them from choking out other plants or to allow them to thrive in more than one location. Some of these will be obvious — if you are growing tansy it will be all over the place by the end of April (in zone 5/6 anyway). Daylilies also spread to random locations and it is easy to spot these tall plants and move them (or get rid of them) as desired.

Some plants, like poppies and scilla in our yard, spread by seed and just need to be thinned. We haven’t thinned the poppies — they are huge and truly impressive so we’re leaving them alone. The large clump of blue scilla, however, was suffocating the pink and white ones.

To thin flowers, gently separate the leaves until you can see the distinct plants (if there are any).

Use a spade to lift the plant you wish to transplant, digging close to the roots but not so close that you might terminally damage them. Generally, start about 4 inches away from the base of the stems and cut in diagonally.

Dig a hole that is twice as wide as what you are transplanting. Put the plant in, cover with dirt, fertilizer (organic! we used kelp in this case) and water well.

**Important: spiders live under plants. If, like me, you don’t like spiders you are already aware of this and probably wear gloves so as not to touch them. However, even if you don’t mind nasty, eight-legged monsters creeping about near your fingertips (or worse ON your fingertips), wear gloves anyway. Even nonpoisonous spiders bite and can cause a nasty infection when they do. Scilla seem especially popular with the arachnid set, btw.