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Hi. My name is Kirsten Segler from The Greenery and what we want to do in
this segment is talk a little bit about a group of plants that we call
Outdoor Tropicals.
Now these are
typically found in equatorial countries.
There they grow year round. They don't really have a dormant season to them because
daylight there is quite uniform.
Here in the Okanagan obviously we have
a cold winter compared to down there
so we treat them as an annual
and can be maybe grown indoor as a tropical in the winter
but typically most people will just compost them
with their annuals in the fall
when its time to do the
fall cleanup.
Now the group of plants I'm talking about are
mainly Canna Lillies
and Elephant Ears. The Elephant Ears can be grouped into two families. The
"Colocasias" and the "Alocasias"
and
these are some great examples here behind me.
We will focus in
on the individual varieties here in the next little bit
just to give you some names and pointers about them.
So one of the most unique thing about
this family of plants, the
Colocasias
and the Canna Lillies is that
they can be grown both in water
or in a potting mix. So we sell them
in small five and a half inch starting in March already so people can buy them early
and keep them indoors and size them up
and then either put them in their pond or
water bowls
or centerpieces and regular planters where you'll have other annuals.
So very
unique, versatile plant
in that regard.
These ones here behind us are in the water feature.
They do tend to
you know, size-up and
grow a lot larger when they are directly in the water.
So keep that in mind. So what you're seeing behind me
is maybe
a little bit bigger than what the average person may get
just growing it in a planter.
Right now, believe it or not is end of September
so
things maybe will look just
a bit better
a month ago but still unbelievable show
for this time of year. Imagine having this kind of look
in your yard end of September.
Just unbelievable, you know?
We might be getting some frost tonight so we decide to do this segment here.
That's one thing, they'd be very sensitive to any kind of frost. These are basically
tropicals
they love the heat in the summer here and as you can see
they turned up quite nice.
The first couple varieties were going to talk about are behind me here
I am going to be cutting some
leaves and samples off as we go through this segment.
Don't panic. We have to basically
bring all these in this week anyway so we will be cutting everything back,
taking it out of the pond,
bring it into the greenhouse; that's where we'll divide it up.
Pot it up into some larger pots
and these are some of the
ones we sell in March
that are sold for a little bit more money in the ten to twelve inch
size bracket
where our typical production is just down in a
five-and-a-half square block.
So to start off,
I want to talk about a variety of
Colocasia called "Fontanesii"
It's this one behind us. It's got a really dark, dark
burgundy stems with the veins going through the leaf
and then the top of the leaf
has just more of a dark green look to it.
This is probably the
largest growing
colored leaf
variety of
Colocasia. There are some just what we called Greenleaf
Colocasias that do get larger, Jack's Giant and Thailand Giant,
but for the
more fancy,
different colored varieties, this is definitely by far the one
you know, that does get the biggest.
Now we're just going to cut this off here to show you an example of
what I'm talking about.
Beautiful, beautiful large leaves like that
and with a nice
dark vein underneath
and the best highlight of it all is probably is that real nice
burgundy stems like that.
I haven't even mentioned yet but most of these
plants here that are in this feature
do tend to like
half-day sun, half-day shade.
So
in this area we've got actually a shade cloth over our pergola
giving it that
perfect filtered light
for these type of plants. Now Canna Lillies
are again, very versatile. Not only can they go in soil or water but they can take
full sun
and they can be in a half-day sun to a half-day shade.
So a little more
versatile
than the
Elephant Ear. The Elephant Ear here
does tend to be better in no more than a half day of direct sun.
An example of that beautiful, almost
black stem
of the Colocasia "Fontanesii" variety. This is absolutely gorgeous
real thick, sturdy.
If you have a little bit of a flowering habit that comes late this season but
they're planning to grow them
for their leaf structure
in contrast in that regard but this is the
flower that develop
late this season. There are some seeds that will form
in this pod if the flower does get pollinated
but typically these are grown
or divided
from root divisions
and in the industry done from a little tissue culture.
The next plant in this grouping behind me is the Canna Lily
"Pretoria"
Another variety on the market which basically looks identical
is called
"Tropicanna Gold"
"Tropicanna Gold" and "Pretoria"
some years we have one, some years the other
but basically you'll get the same kind of look throughout the season.
Again I'm just going to cut a portion of this off just so you get an idea of how beautiful
the plant is in the way of
the leaf structure.
Beautiful
yellow and green
lining
on the foliage.
There's a beautiful fresh leaf opening up here.
The sun shines through this
up high, just a
beautiful golden look to them.
Really, really nice to have in the yard.
Again like I was saying earlier, Canna Lillies
typically known as a great centerpiece for planters in full sun. So that's how
they're mainly sold on the market
but
they can also be used
in your water features or in water,
little water gardens and so on.
They do well that way also.
Do you have a excellent flowering habit?
this variety here blooms orange
Again, it is late in the season so
things are finishing up here but
this is actually a new, fresh
pod about to open
but "Pretoria" does have a nice orange
flower to it. So each stalk that comes out of your mother plant will form
clusters of flowers.
You will get more than one like here is
this one and this one is developing here on this side as well
but
just get to a certain height, you get two to three per stalk and then that is it. Now
you simply can just dead head this
when they're done blooming.
Cut that off and then still leave
the beautiful foliage
throughout the season. These leaves will hold all season long. We haven't really done any
cutting back on the Cannas here.
Just the odd smaller leaf, maybe a lower leaf that gets tattered
but they really will hold all season long
you know, other than the flowers being dead-headed
throughout the months.
That's all you have to do.
The next plant we're going to talk about behind me here is Canna Lily "Durban"
So also another variety on the market called
"Tropicanna"
These two are very similar. In some years we carry "Durban"
in some years we'll have "Tropicanna".
Again they both have these beautiful
orange stripes. The "Pretoria" have the yellow stripes
"Durban" is
more of an orangey-red kind of
stripe to the leaf.
Absolutely gorgeous.
And it again, like "Pretoria" and "Tropicana Gold" has an orange...
orange flower to it.
There we go.
Still some nice pots coming off. This one looks like, obviously we didn't get
around to
dead heading but this portion bloomed quite some time ago and
petals have all fallen off but that's the part there that
we dead-headed.
but here we still
are enjoying some color and you know,
getting to fall really.
The next three varieties of plants we're going to talk about are all Colocasias.
The first over here is
"Diamond Head".
The second is behind me over there, the lighter colored one,
that's "Elena".
And over here to my right,
this variety is called "Illustris".
And I'll show some samples a little closer up for you. A beautiful leaf back here
of "Diamond Head".
A little bit of that textured look to it. Really dark,
blue-ey
vein occurring here
and a
lighter stem than
the "Fontanesii" variety
more of a red look but still beautiful
red ribbing the backside of the leaf
and this is named after the Diamond Head Mountain in the State of Hawaii.
And here is the Colocasia "Elena"
The example behind me of the larger plant and we took a leaf off here just to show you.
So this is
a chartreuse-colored variety
and works very well against the darker leaf ones like "Diamond Head"
and there is another variety called "Black Magic".
Plant them together
they really complement each other
very well
the yellowy-green color against the dark black.
So it's a fairly ordinary leaf other than the bright color to it. You know, the back is simple but
again a must-have if you like that
contrast between light and dark.
And the next variety is the Colocasia
"Illustris"
An example behind us here we took a leaf off from the inner part of the plant.
We got some really good contrast and patch occurring on the leaf here. The
dark
black color
and the lighter green
and you still distinguish the
the ribbing in there
on the leaf as well.
Very nice contrast. The
back is just plain.
Next two varieties, one is a Canna Lily, one is a Colocasia.
The Canna Lily here to my left, this is called
"Australia"
And behind me here, this is Colocasia
"Black Magic"
The Canna Lily "Australia" is becoming one of our most popular sellers.
It has a very consistent,
dark color
and a nice shine to the leaf.
And for this...and fast growing, multiplies well so you get multiple stalks
usually in one season from this variety.
It just has a nice
glossy, burgundy
foliage to it,
nice fast grower.
Height-wise it's...
easy you're going to get four,
four feet out of it in any kind of planter
situation.
So a really nice centerpiece for planters.
And the color of the flower is of red color. Again it's the end of the season so not the
greatest example but hopefully you
could see that there. Some clusters are red. Red-blooming variety of Canna Lily.
So here's a leaf sample of the variety "Black Magic". So Colocasia
"Black Magic"
It has a true, black leaf.
A flat look to it. Not as shiny as the variety "Diamond Head"
but still if you're
interested in black, nothing
beats this for a nice, large
black leaf.
This variety isn't quite as big as some of the others so you don't
tend to get
as larger leaves as some of the other ones
in this segment.
Again
what a nice contrast it makes with the chartreuse.
That's where they really pull together. See the black and the
chartreuse of the "Elena"
work well together.