Great-grandmother grew ribbon beds of coleus, carefully pinched to keep them from becoming uneven or straggly and never allowed to bloom.
Grandmother filled hanging baskets on the porch with Trailing Queen and grew a few handsome specimen plants in jardinieres here and there.
Mother practically forgot coleus – she heard mealy bugs destroyed them, anyway, so why bother?
But the daughter sees these old-time plants in a new light. Wherever there is moisture, a little shade, and summertime warmth, coleus appears – in the old hanging baskets and jardinieres, a mosaic of color against the house, gay spots amid the plain green of early-flowering shrubbery.
They double as cut flowers indoors, or they make possible the creation of a beautiful bouquet from a few meager blossoms.
Nicotine sulfate solution, with soapsuds, takes care of the mealy bugs, which seldom attack coleus grown rapidly and kept in an airy, well-ventilated location.
Right Coleus For Your Garden
Though he may easily have more than a hundred different coleus, each grower has plants that appeal particularly to him since there are so many types.
Sizes range from leaves as tiny as one’s thumbnail to those larger than an outspread hand.
There are delicate trailers that spread widely but are never very tall; others make magnificent specimens five feet high.
All shades of red are represented in foliage color, with countless combinations of bright colors with greens.
There are velvety black, green-bordered leaves and others marked with white and cream. Pink, salmon, and brown shades are as bright as flowers.
In leaf form and texture, coleus leaves are satiny, smooth, iridescent, and glistening or have pebbly crumpled surfaces, plain and ruffled, scalloped or laciniated, or with edges of complicated picots.
Suitable Growing Conditions
To develop and display their beauty to the best advantage, coleus must have ample room in the open ground or suitably large containers. Rich, light soil, preferably leaf mold and dairy fertilizer, is best.
Sufficient water, the soil is soaked daily, and some direct sunlight, but with protection from the hottest noonday sunshine, complete the requirements of coleus.
Large-leaved or very crumpled and ruffly sorts may break in heavy rains and will do better on the edge of a porch where they receive some protection.
Growing Coleus From Cuttings
Coleus growers have always exchanged cuttings, thus selecting the plants they most admire.
Due to the difficulty of describing the many leaf patterns and colors, ordering cuttings by mail usually results in surprises as the plants grow.
Southern growers offer cuttings in Spring and Fall; they do not ship well in hot weather and, of course, cannot be subjected to freezing temperatures. In the north, coleus brighten Winter greenhouses.
Growing Coleus From Seed
Coleus seed is fine but germinates quickly if the temperature is warm, though plants may not appear for several weeks if the nights are chilly. Seed may be sowed thinly in flats and covered very lightly.
Seedlings must have some direct sunlight as soon as they come up, but of course, require protection from wind, drying, heavy rain, and hot sunshine.
They should never be permitted to crowd and maybe transplanted easily even before they have their first true leaves.
Colors and characteristic leaf forms often do not develop for several weeks, so one need not be disappointed if all seedlings are green at first. Also, in almost every lot, there seem to be some plants that revert to plain green or dull red.
Such plants may be handsome when large, however, or the colors may become more attractive in brighter sunlight. In cold weather, some beautiful green, white, and speckled coleus become plain green or dull.
The most interesting angle of growing coleus from seed is using seeds gathered from one’s plants. Then there is the puzzle of what possible cross or hidden inheritance could produce the amazing variations that appear among seedlings.
There is always the feeling that perhaps this brilliant beauty is a “never before in this world” plant, all one’s own.
44659 by Adelaide M. Muller