Kitchen Garden Forum

Earlier in spring I found a few unidentified plants growing in a kerbside gutter nearby with attractive foliage so pulled them up and transported them to one of my borders (Yes , I know but I often do crazy things! ). They turned out to be purple toadflax and are now tall healthy plants about to break out into a purple flower. But I've done some research and apart from learning that bees love them, they seem to be listed as annuals, perennials or biennials.
Does anybody grow this? How do I treat them once they finish flowering in October? Chop them back and hope they'll regrow or hope they self seed ? If I prune off the main shoots once they've flowered will other flowering shoots appear from lower down the plants?

I wouldn't expect wild flowers to give a second flower if you cut them down, I'd leave them to set seed myself, look nice and healthy

I believe they are annuals, Primrose, but they do seed themselves quite happily all round, so if you leave them to their own devices, you will probably get lots more.

Hi Primrose,
The more up to date name of Purple Toadflax is Linaria Purpurea and it is a perennial. It is not a native plant and it is a plant originally from Italy which is quite popular in herbaceous borders and gives good colour.

Thanks for your inputs. Thwnourple flowers are just coming out and the bees seem to be liking the flowers so I shall let them go to seed and see what happens.