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Planting, Growing, and Caring for Pansies
Pansies are the cheerful flowers with upturned 鈥渇aces.鈥 They love cool weather and are popular for growing in spring and fall. They鈥檙e also edible, adding color to salads, drinks, and cakes. Here鈥檚 how to plant pansies and keep them growing and blooming for bright, happy gardens and containers.
About Pansies
Pansies are a type of Viola (Viola 脳 wittrockiana) with large heart-shaped, overlapping petals and one of the widest ranges of bright, pretty colors and patterns.
Suitable for containers and borders and as ground cover, they are a go-to flower for reliable color almost year-round in some places. Pansies look pretty in a monochrome scheme or mixed colors; they also look pretty when planted with other cool-season flowers such as primroses, trailing lobelia, and sweet alyssum.
Are Pansies Annual or Perennial Flowers?
Most gardeners treat pansies (and all violas) as an annual, but they鈥檙e actually hardy in USDA Hardiness Zones 3-8. They tend to get too leggy in the heat of summer. There hasn鈥檛 been much success in producing heat-tolerant pansies that can adequately survive hot weather.
Pansies are surprisingly hearty in cold weather, though. They鈥檒l survive a frost, bouncing back from even single-digit temperatures. If the blooms wither in the cold, the plants will often stay alive to bloom again, which makes them a great flowering plant for fall and early winter color.
Growing
How to Care for Pansies
- Remember to water pansies regularly. One of the most common reasons pansies fail is that they are not watered enough, so if they are not doing well, try watering them more.
- You can use a general, all-purpose fertilizer around your pansies to help them grow. Be wary of using a nitrogen-heavy fertilizer, as this can result in more foliage than flowers.
- Remove faded/dead flowers to encourage the plants to produce more blooms and prolong the blooming season. You can either pinch off the flower bud or cut it off just below the faded bud.
Catherine Boeckmann
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To encourage flowering, be sure to pinch or snip off the spent flowers. This way, the plant won’t waste nutrients into forming seeds. In spring, you might also try adding a little fertilizer. Pansies like it cool, and will fade as it heats up in summer. If they are out in full sun as the weather warms, you might put provide partial shade, which helps them to last longer. Keep up with watering, so that soil is moist but not soggy. Over winter, the plants may cease to bloom, but should start blooming again as the soil warms.
I purchsed several small pots of pansies. Looks like maybe 3 per pot. Do I separate them before planting in the ground, or space each pot full 6 to 8 inches apart? thanks
If you can easily separate the plants and space them 6 inches apart it will give you more bang for your buck! If you would rather have a planting that has a full look then by all means plant each potful as far apart as you want.
Hey, today I bought a small pot with a pansie plant in it at my school's fair. It's a princess series - purple and has one flower with lots of leaves and a small pod about the size of a pinky nail. I was hoping anyone could tell me the best way to look after it :) thank you!
I plan on using planted pansies for the centerpieces at my early October wedding which is about thirty days away. I felt like I had to buy them now since the greenhouse won't be getting any more in. They seem very leggy but if I cut them back (more than dead heading) I am afraid they will not be blooming for my wedding. Is 30 days enough time for them to produce new flowers and is there something I can do to keep them from getting leggy again?
I planted pansies in large containers this year and they went crazy, beautiful but crazy big. One of the containers the pansies out grew and started losing color and vibrancy. I cut them back thinking they would just bush out again. So far it kind of looks like my lawn, like cut grass. Will they come back into bloom?
Pansies are treated as an annual (one-time) flower that can bloom like crazy and have lots of energy that sometimes just lasts a short time. The best way to keep them blooming is to "pinch." This means to remove the flowers (and the stem) once they wilt by pinching them at their base.If they get "leggy," with extra long stems, you can pinch back these roots, too, so the plant looks more compact and neat. We've never cut down our pansies as you did, but we're not sure they will grow back.
I bought pansies and put them in a pot. They have grown and done so well, I didn't know I had to dead head them but will. Can I transplant them in the ground? It is now almost July and they are beautiful. If I can't transplant them I understand I could take them into the house if they survive the heat in Chicago. Thanks so much for the wonderful information here.
Syvia, Deadheading is easy: Just cut or clip off spent blooms. The reason is to stop the plant from directing its energy to making seeds in the old bloom. You want the plant to use its energy on new blooms.
As for planting in ground...yes and no. Pansies do well in ground鈥攂ut in or out of ground, they thrive best when temps are from about 40掳F at night to about 60掳F during the day. That's why we see them so often in spring.
You can certainly bring them indoors but do not be disheartened when they eventually get leggy and then fade away. They just do. Can't be helped. Enjoy them while you have them!
I live in zone 7 and have a planter of pansies since mid April. They were beautiful till now, but have become leggy and the blooms look wilted. I have been pinching off the dead blooms and watering it every evening, but it hasn't helped. Any suggestions?
