Do Cornflowers Come Back Every Year?

Want to know if you can enjoy your cornflower plants year after year or if you will have to keep growing new plants from seed? Well then, this article is for you!

Do Cornflowers Come Back Every Year?

Almost all cornflowers are annuals, so will not come back every year. There is one perennial cornflower which will come back every year.

So, to answer the question, probably not, unless you happen to be growing Centaurea Montana, the perennial cornflower.

Centaurea Montana (Perennial Cornflower)

Also known as mountain cornflower this is commonly referred to as perennial cornflower. Again this plant needs regular deadheading in order to prolong blooming time.

With perennial cornflowers you can cut the whole plant back to the ground after the first flowering, this can encourage a second flush of flowers and foliage to appear, reinvigorating the plant.

Harvesting Seed

If you want to try and control where your cornflowers pop up then you can harvest the seeds and grow them yourself before planting out.

This will just give you more control over where the plants come up and also the number of plants that come up.

To harvest cornflower seeds just let the seeds start to form on the flower before cutting them off. This sounds more complicated than it is, you essentially just need to wait for the old flower head to go a brown colour.

Then snip it off and store the seeds in a paper envelope in a nice dry spot until you are ready to sow them next year.

Let Them Self Seed

This is what most people do with cornflowers, just let them go to seed and spread themselves around your garden.

This works well in cottage and informal style gardens but obviously doesn’t work as well in planned, formal gardens.

How To Grow Cornflowers From Seed?

Cornflowers are really easy to grow from seed and don’t require much care or attention to get going.

You usually direct sow them onto the ground where they are to grow, you don’t need to use a seed tray or a pot.

You scatter the seeds onto the surface of the soil and then rake in, if you don’t have a rake you can sprinkle a little topsoil over the top of them or brush them into the soil with your hands.

You then want to make sure the seeds get a little moisture to help them germinate, if there is rain forecast anytime soon then you don’t need to do anything and just let the rain do this for you.

If it is very dry though and no rain is forecast then just give them a little sprinkling of water and water them again when they have started growing if it still hasn’t rained.