Also receive the Daily newsletter including gardening tips, weather, astronomical events, and more.
Planting, Growing, and Caring for Morning Glory Flowers
Planting
Choose a sunny spot. Plant in moderately fertile, well-draining soil to encourage good foliage growth followed by plenty of flowers.
Finally, choose a location that is sheltered from strong, drying winds. Give them a fence, lattice, or trellis to climb up so that vines don’t crowd out other ground-level plants.
When to Plant Morning Glories
- Sow seeds as early as possible after the danger of frost is over.
How to Plant Morning Glories
- Germination rates are improved by filing down the seeds just enough to break the outer coat and then soaking them for 24 hours before planting. This encourages them to send out a root (it looks like a little worm).
- Cover lightly with 1/4-inch of soil. Space seeds about 6 inches apart.
- Water thoroughly at planting.
- Seedlings should appear in about a week; some seeds may be stubborn and take 2 or 3 weeks to sprout.
Growing
- Apply a balanced liquid fertilizer after planting. Do not over-fertilize, or the vine may grow more foliage than flowers.
- Support this climbing plant with structures like trellises, pergolas, or arches.
- Tip: Morning glories climb by twining their vines around a support, so make sure that whichever type of structure you grow them against has plenty of space for whorling!
- Morning glories are low maintenance; just be sure to water during particularly dry periods.
- Mulch to retain moisture and suppress weeds.
- If you don’t want the plant to reseed itself, pinch off old flowers before they turn into seedpods. This can also encourage the plant to keep producing more flowers.
Types
- ‘Heavenly Blue’ are the classic morning glories with rich azure (blue) flowers and white throats. These plants climb to 12 feet.
- ‘Sٳ ’H’ has bright red flowers with a white throat. It climbs to 15 feet.
- Here are more recommended morning glory varieties!
Wit and Wisdom
- Morning glories are one of September’s birth flowers.
- If you’ve ever grown sweet potatoes, you may notice a resemblance between their leaves and flowers and those of the morning glory. Unsurprisingly, the plants are related; both belong to the genus Ipomoea.
- Additionally, Morning Glories can help predict the weather!
- The Moonflower is a type of Morning Glory that opens at night!
Catherine Boeckmann
ADVERTISEMENT
If you’re satisfied with how bushy the plant is, try pinching off the tips of some of the vines. This can encourage it to refocus its efforts on flowers instead of more foliage.
I have a problem with Whiskey Weed (that's the only name I know for this obnoxious weed, it maybe only locally named that), it grows rapidly and multiplies. The root system probably goes deeper than what one pulls out of the ground. It has a white bloom later in the year. I have tried natural weed killer to no avail, cutting it down is literally a daily chore.
Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance.
A.P.
I took all the vines off my trellis. Will they come back?thanks deb
How do I know it's safe to put out pots of morning glories that I started inside?
A vine suddenly appeared in my garden this year. They were beautiful Morning Glories. I put up a trellis for them and they are doing well. The leaves are not heart shaped, though. They have three points, not one. Is this a different variety?
It sounds like you have bindweed, a noxious weed. See here /13-common-garden-weeds
and this from above:
The attractive annual morning glory (Ipomoea spp.) is often mistaken for its perennial cousin, field bindweed (Convolvulus arvensis), which is an aggressive, invasive weed native to Europe and Asia. Field bindweed—also called “perennial morning glory” or “creeping jenny”—grows similarly to annual morning glories, but sends out deep, deep roots, which make it very difficult to get rid of and allow it to overwinter in areas where cultivated morning glories could not.
To tell the difference between the plants, look closely at the leaves, flowers, and vines:
- Field bindweed leaves are typically smaller than those of annual morning glories. Morning glory leaves may be 2 inches or more across; bindweed leaves rarely exceed 2 inches. Bindweed leaves are also shaped more like an arrowhead than those of morning glories, which are heart shaped.
- Field bindweed flowers only occur in either pink or white, whereas annual morning glory flowers may be pink, white, magenta, blue, purple, or red, and are much larger than those of the bindweed.
- Morning glory vines are usually thicker than bindweed’s vines, and typically have small hairs.
The attractive annual morning glory (Ipomoea spp.) is often mistaken for its perennial cousin, field bindweed (Convolvulus arvensis), which is an aggressive, invasive weed native to Europe and Asia. Field bindweed—also called “perennial morning glory” or “creeping jenny”—grows similarly to annual morning glories, but sends out deep, deep roots, which make it very difficult to get rid of and allow it to overwinter in areas where cultivated morning glories could not.
To tell the difference between the plants, look closely at the leaves, flowers, and vines:
- Field bindweed leaves are typically smaller than those of annual morning glories. Morning glory leaves may be 2 inches or more across; bindweed leaves rarely exceed 2 inches. Bindweed leaves are also shaped more like an arrowhead than those of morning glories, which are heart shaped.
- Field bindweed flowers only occur in either pink or white, whereas annual morning glory flowers may be pink, white, magenta, blue, purple, or red, and are much larger than those of the bindweed.
- Morning glory vines are usually thicker than bindweed’s vines, and typically have small hairs.
I also planted some morning glories years ago - mixed purple, white and pink - and they have self- seeded ever since, all over the garden. I agree - be sure you know where you want them! The exception is the Heavenly Blue variety, which is my favorite. Because it takes longer to mature than other varieties,I have to start it indoors to transplant out in May (Finger Lakes region of NYS). It has never reseeded, like the other varieties. It also has larger leaves and much stronger vines than the others, so I can see how it could grow to be a nuisance in warmer climates!
A good thing, if you want it! Be very careful where you plant them and be sure you want them there pretty much forever. While the suggestion to snip off the dead flowers to prevent going to seed would work in theory - whoa - that's going to require that you never, ever leave the vines and just keep snipping all day and night. Seriously. If you want them, I highly recommend them. They require almost no care. They look stunning at the middle and end of summer. To keep the vines from getting nuts, you can easily chop off segments at the top. At the end of the season, they look cool for Halloween as they brown, a neat haunted house appearance. Then, just rip them all down - messy, but easy. I have a small porch stoop and they grow up each side. Not a huge area, but literally tens of thousands of seeds. I sweep up the seeds on the porch and whatever has fallen into the ground remains for next year. In early spring, you'll be able to easily yank new sprouts that are in any areas of the garden where you have other plants. Just do it early. I planted one seed pack ten years ago. That's all it took. Interestingly, I've tried to start them in a semi-shaded area in the yard many times but nope - they don't take off fast enough. They do require full sun.
Wow, thank you, Mike! Lots of enthusiasm and good advice here!
