Prune off all the dried flowers. Shear them. They will grow up looking normal again.

Otherwise you will have bare sections of stem when the dried flowers fall off.
They will look funny with growth on top of bare stems. They will get lanky too.

I started growing heathers a couple of years ago. I prune mine (shear as buyorsell said) in early spring, once the snow has melted. I cut them back about 1/2 or 2/3 - they are now nice, neat 'buns'. I got this information from Alan Bloom's book on heaths, heathers and conifers - I'm not sure of the exact title at the moment. If you don't shear them each spring, they will get lanky (just like bos said, too).

Thanks so much for the responses. Just so I am sure that I have this correct - I want to shear off the dried flowers (shear them from the stems) and then trim a bit off of the tops of the new growth? Thanks again!

Hi Stacey,

In my case, after the winter, my heathers were about 12" tall. By shearing, I mean I cut these heathers back (I used a pair of scissors) all the way down to about 4 or 5" tall. This way they grow in fuller, and don't get lanky (which is what you're experiencing with yours now, by the sounds of it).

So, I'll assume yours are about a foot tall (give or take)?What I would do, is just cut them back to maybe one half. Or, if you don't want to cut them back that far, just cut off the flowers down to green growth - whatever looks good, in your opinion. As long as you cut into green growth, they should be fine. Next spring, cut them back to about 4 or 5" before they start growing. Don't suppose you could post a photo?

Here is a pic

Here is a link that might be useful: pruning heathers