Hesperantha coccinea

Paul Tyerman ptyerman@ozemail.com.au
Fri, 03 Nov 2006 04:22:45 PST
Howdy All,

I have to laugh at this conversation.  This is another one of these 
"One man's treasure is another's trash" stories........ I used to 
grow the white, pink and red forms of Hesperantha coccinea (at that 
point Schizostylos or something like that) until they became invasive 
weeds for me.  The red one expanded the second year by about a foot 
in radius within 12 months which was when I decided they were a bad 
idea.  Neither of the other two were as bad, but they were still 
multiplying a bit too healthily for my liking.  It took me 3 years to 
eradicate the lovely little dears.  Even then about 2 years after 
that I discovered a couple of small pieces that appeared about 2 
metres away (seedlings?  Don't know).  They've never appeared again 
since then thankfully.

One day I might try them again, in a similar setup as I grow 
Crocosmias.... i.e in a pot which is carefully protected to make sure 
they cannot escape out the drainage holes! LOL  It really goes to 
show just how much difference different climates can make to how easy 
or hard something is to grow.  I can definitely vouch for the fact 
that -8'C with no cover is definitely not going to affect them, or at 
least not the ones I used to grow anyway.

Good luck to those of you who are trying to grow them 
unsuccessfully.  They are rather pretty flowers at the right time of 
year, and a large clump of them can look rather impressive.  They 
were just a little too boisterous for my liking here!!

Cheers.

Paul Tyerman
Canberra, Australia - USDA Zone Equivalent approx. 8/9

Growing an eclectic collection of plants from all over the world 
including Aroids, Crocus, Cyclamen, Erythroniums, Fritillarias, 
Galanthus, Irises, Trilliums (to name but a few) and just about 
anything else that doesn't move!! 


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