Cutting back ornamental grasses

Ornamental grasses are a popular choice for home landscapes and for good reason. These easy-to-grow plants look amazing not only in the summer season but also during the winter months as well. For this reason, many gardeners choose to wait and cut them back in late winter. It is perfectly fine to cut back these grasses in the fall but leaving them for winter provides great visual interest to the garden and also provides shelter for wildlife and insects.

To keep grasses looking good for the next season, trimming them back is necessary. If you don’t do this, new growth will simply come up through the brown stems from the previous season and they will not look their best.

Cutting back these grasses is pretty straightforward – you basically just whack them back down to ground level. There are some pointers, however, to make the job easier and less messier.

If you done this job before, you know that it can be a messy one and the cut foliage tends to fly all over the place and is difficult to gather and dispose of. To make this easier, use a string  or other type of material to tie around the middle portion of the stalks. I find that a bungee cord works really well for this. This method works particularly well for tall ornamental grasses, such as ‘Karl Forester’.

After they are secure, cut off the foliage at ground level (about 3-5 inches from the base). You can use whatever tool you prefer for this. The fastest for me are hedge trimmers. After the grass has been cut, you will have a neat bundle to dispose of. The spent grasses can be placed on the compost or used as mulch in your garden beds.

In just a few weeks, you will see new shoots emerging. The new growth will have light and less competition now that the growth from last year has been removed.