Close up of the painting “Mercie Cutting Flowers” by Edmund Charles Tarbell, 1912. (Currier Museum of Art)
Cut flowers are such a pleasure for many of us that we enjoy always having some flowers inside. Even just one flower stuck in a bottle makes me feel happy. In the spring, I fill the vases with daffodils, and in late summer, the sunshine produced from a vase of black-eyed Susans lights up a room.
Remember that composite flowers with small petals surrounding a central disc like Susans last longer if they are picked with single stems, one per flower in the vase. A lot of good yellow flowers for cutting bloom when it is hot----sunflowers of all types and sizes and annuals like marigolds and coreopsis and those of other colors such as zinnias, cleome, salvia, nasturtiums, dahlias and cosmos.
Experiment with fillers in the vase if you don’t have enough cut flowers, e.g. airy Queen Anne’s Lace grows wild in meadows at this time of the year. I also use coleus cuttings from my garden to mix with flowers if they are scarce during hot weather. I also love to use opal basil as a filler, as its dark leaves make a nice contrast with most colors.
When the flower heads of goldenrod are immature and a greenish gold, I cut them for my vases as immature sprays that do not release any pollen.
Daylily blossoms only last a day whether in water or not, so I always have one “daylily of the day” adorning my table indoors when they are blooming outside.
