Why Didn’t My Kousa Dogwood Bloom This Year?

We have Cindy in Massillon, who says, ‘I have a question about my Kousa dogwood. We bought it from Rohr’s and they planted it three years ago, and so far we have had no blooms. It has been fertilized, and yes, we have clay. It’s on each side of the house. It gets a lot of sun.’

I do know last year, a lot of the dogwoods, they set their blooms in the late spring, early summer, or fall. And so those blooms are actually set going into winter. Sometimes if people will trim in the fall, they’re actually cutting the flower buds off. This winter, we had a pretty cold, windy winter, and it did freeze out some of the flower buds on the tips of the dogwoods.

We did see that quite, quite often this spring where the leaves came out, but the flowers just didn’t do anything. And it’s because those buds basically dried out in the wintertime. So hopefully, we won’t have a winter that harsh again.  There is a spray called Wiltproof that a lot of times we use on rhododendrons and azaleas, that after Thanksgiving, but before Christmas, you can spray that on the tips of the dogwood trees, and it’ll protect those buds.

And a lot of times, the first few years, they are establishing roots. They’re spending their time rooting. So usually third, fourth year, that is when you see more blooming.

Some fertilizer only lasts, like if it’s a Miracle-Gro or Miracle-Gro-like product like Jack’s, they only last seven days, and so people put it down and they think it has a longer lasting effect than it does. The granular fertilizer that we sell at the nursery lasts for six months, so you put it down in the spring, and it feeds it for the whole rest of the year. That’s a much better choice for a tree, where the liquids sometimes are a better choice for annuals.

Some granulars also only last four to six weeks. Actually, most granulars only last four to six weeks, so make sure that you’re doing it more than once and know how long your fertilizer lasts. If you’re not sure, you can take a picture of the bag, bring it into the nursery, and we can tell you about that fertilizer and how to best use it.

They don’t like to be too wet, but the Kousa dogwood is more forgiving than the other varieties of dogwoods on moisture. You want some moisture in the ground for the Kousa, but you do not want to drown it. Now, if we get into a situation like last July and August, where we go 100 plus days with no measurable rain, then watering is going to be essential and crucial, because the roots aren’t down super deep yet.

But being that it’s the third year in the ground, you shouldn’t have to water near as much. Only in those really long stretches of dry in year three should you have to water. But you do not want to overwater it. If you pull the mulch back, and you can take a good handful of soil, and you squeeze it, and you open your hand up, and when you touch that ball of dirt, it doesn’t crumble apart, there’s good moisture in that soil. You shouldn’t need to water.

I think it’s probably just because the tree’s young, it’s rooting in, we had that really windy winter, so that can actually dry the buds off. Now, the deeper the root system is on the tree, so the older it gets, the less likely that is to happen. Most of the dogwoods around my house did not bloom this year.

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