How To Plant Coleus

And then there's the Under the Seatm coleus plants.) hail from Canada, where they were bred by students at Saskatchewan University. They are readily available through many nurseries, garden centers or mail-order seed suppliers.

If the leaves fade and lose color, the plant is probably getting too much sunlight. (Never let the bottom of the pot stand directly in water.)Pinch the tips of the plant frequently to keep it bushy.

I, for one, love them, as do many others. Plant coleus close together as bedding plants or tuck them into baskets and containers for a fast growing and spectacular addition.Caring for coleus is just as easy.

Mixing the seeds with fine sand before sowing can help you to spread the seeds more evenly with a bit more of a gap between the seeds.freestar.queue.push(function() { googletag.display("div-gpt-ad-300x250-ATF-1"); });After you have spread the coleus seeds,...

Unless you take precautions beforehand, that first bout of cold weather or frost will quickly kill off yourOverwintering coleus plants is actually quite easy. It may also help to trim back the top half of growth to reduce shock, though this is not required.Allow...

Keep reading to learn about potted coleus care and how to grow coleus in containers.Growing coleus in a pot is an ideal way to keep it. It won't grow larger than the container it's in, but if moved to a bigger container, it will fill it out, reaching...

The age of the plant and stress can contribute to the formation of blooms on your coleus.freestar.queue.push(function() { googletag.display("div-gpt-ad-300x250-ATF-1"); });Stress can come in the form of excess heat, dry conditions and late season cold...

The thumbnail image (top right) is of Coleus 'Handy Andy'. At local nurseries, Sun Coleus are often specialty items in larger $5 or $10 pots. For popup captions, "hover" your mouse over images and links.

During the 1800s Coleus enjoyed a frenzy of popularity in Victorian England. You may be surprised and delighted at some of the whacky and fun names given to these cultivars like. An Outline Of General Botany.

Often they will be easier to grow from seed and will not change if allowed to pollinate in the wild. When you collect the seeds, you don't know which genes are dominant. In the case of saved coleus seeds, coleus isis actually a patented cultivar.

I couldn't take photos as I was drilling, so you'll have to use your imagination on this part.Something I should divulge here is that this is very messy, leaving little shavings of plastic everywhere.

Both are wildly popular at the moment. Many varieties of both plants have fanciful--if not downright weird--names. Removing leaves that are below the water surface also helps. The best that hostas can do is leaves in shades of green, white, yellow, and...

Amidst all the others it would survive with a minimum of care and would hang upside down and sideways trying to capture attention, not aware that it was already at center stage in my mother's windows.Other than the occasional roses my father bought for...

The active ingredient (forskolin) has been used in thousands of studies as an adenylyl cyclase activator and cAMP stimulator. Some species are edible herbs and root vegetables too, with medicinal health claims.

Competition was keen for this pleasant task.Finally summer vacation arrived and the flowers were left to fend for themselves. The tallest is ‘Medallion', reaching 24 to 36 inches tall.Plant butter daisy en masse in flower beds and borders, or group...

Once they have filled this flowering gap, biennial vegetables like celery, parsley and hardy greens can produce huge amounts of seeds! One year I grew beet seeds from overwintered roots, and the seed spikes got so heavy they required multiple stakes.

Use a sharp hoe to keep weed seedlings under control Zero Tolerance Tackle recently germinated weeds in existing beds by disturbing the surface of the ground as soon as they appear.

They'll feed the lawn, ensuring it keeps producing more healthy growth for you to cut and use. Best of all, mulch can be made – for free! – in your own garden. The value of mulching is one of the most important things I've ever learned as a gardener.

Level places from which to work are invaluable when gardening on a slope, because gravity pulls people downhill, too. It's like being on a stair-step machine sometimes but you get used to it, which may be one of the reasons why living in the mountains...

Summer Compost for Fall Veggies My new seedlings of broccoli, cabbage, kale, kohlrabi and other widely spaced plants get a huge helping of fresh summer compost, buried by the spadeful at the bottoms of their planting holes, with a little organic fertilizer...

Like many flowering plants, the most effective way to speed up ripening is to simply remove ripe fruits as they appear. Tomatoes, for example, need a minimum temperature of 10°C (50°F) to fully develop.

These issues are heartbreaking when they occur, but the good news is they can usually be avoided by carefully performing one simple annual maintenance task: summer pruning. Avoid removing branches that are less than three years old unless you have to.

Photo by Christopher Holden Fine, smooth fishing line is the best thread for your ristra because it offers least resistance, enabling the chilies to slide on with ease. Earlier in the year I shared some top tips for growing super-spicy peppers .

Mulches may not be very high-tech, but they are incredibly effective in a hot summer. Concentrate your watering where it's needed: young seedlings to help them establish, salad leaves to stop them wilting, fruiting vegetables like tomatoes and anything...

Plant some seed potatoes in late summer and you could be enjoying a bonanza of earthy nuggets from late autumn right through to Christmas. Check the shoots periodically for aphids and plant them before they begin to wither.

Aim to leave one fruit every couple of inches (5-8cm), or if it's easier, one pair of plums every six inches (15cm). Apples and other trees are already full of young fruits, which will grow on to give a delicious crop towards the end of the growing season.

Hanging up sticky traps is also a great way to monitor populations of whitefly early on in the season – act immediately when you spot them. The whitefly larvae are still alive at this point and it's only when the parasite is almost ready to hatch out...