Cutting back the perennial border

Here we are at the main perennial border at St Erth. It is mid-may so it's when we start looking at cutting back our herbaceous perennials.

So we've cut back plenty of the dahlias, not cutting back the later ones, so there's some wonderful decisions to be made as a gardener in perennial gardening of what to cut back and why to cut it back.

The Dahlia is when they start to die down look a bit daggy, so they get cut back ready for new spring growth whereas, when we start coming through to things like this beautiful miscanthus or even this beautiful Aquila that's going into seed, it provides great winter interest, we don't cut it back early we leave it to look like it's dead over winter and beautiful dried seed heads.

That in itself provides winter interest but also great habitat for many insects and birds to feed on and live in.