Anderson's Tradescantia - A Flower For A Shady Garden And Window Sills

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

Tradescantia, familiar and unfamiliar

Favorite plants get into our gardens in different ways. We acquire some on the advice of friends or neighbors, while seeing others on the pages of glossy magazines, we certainly want to grow ourselves.

But there are plants that come to us as if by accident, against our will, and for a long time delight us with their beauty. That is how Tradescantia, a plant with a very familiar name, but then completely unfamiliar to me, settled in my garden.

In the spring I bought Clematis at the market, and since the roots of it and Tradescantia are similar, I did not see a new plant. Clematis planted in a flower garden, but soon a plant with a pair of narrow leaves appeared among its shoots.

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It didn't look like the weeds I knew, and I decided to watch it. In addition, I did not dare to remove it, and because I was afraid to damage the still immature sprouts of clematis. Soon an arrow appeared from the middle of narrow leaves, and on it an inflorescence, consisting of several buds in the form of droplets.

Imagine my surprise when one early morning I saw how a sky-blue flower with three petals blossomed from one such drop. And then every morning one or two flowers bloomed on the stem, which closed by midday. However, I noticed that in cloudy, especially rainy weather, the flower looks brighter and lives longer.

Anderson's Tradescantia is not a very popular plant, so I found it with great difficulty in reference books, but when I found it, I was even more surprised, especially the name. After all, I have known the houseplant Tradescantia for a long time, but my Tradescantia was not like it. It turned out that among the representatives of Tradescantia there are many unpretentious perennials - both thermophilic, which are used for indoor gardening, and frost-resistant, grown in open ground.

Tradescantia belongs to the Commelin family and is named after the English gardeners and botanists of the 17th century - the father and son of the Tradescants.

In total, about a hundred species of this plant are known - with erect or fragile stems lying on the soil surface. My Tradescantia x andersoniana is named after the American botanist Edgar Anderson, who studied this plant. This is a hybrid based on the Virginia Tradescantia and two other wild species.

Currently, many varieties have been bred that differ in height (from 20 to 60 cm), in color of flowers (white, blue, blue, lilac, purple, crimson) and size of flowers. Bred varieties with simple and double flowers. Unfortunately, our domestic market does not offer very many varieties of this wonderful flower.

Today I have three varieties of Anderson's Tradescantia, two of which I have grown from seeds. Anderson's Tradescantia has the ability to cross freely and easily, so when self-sowing, you can expect the appearance of plants with other traits. So, with self-sowing, I grew Tradescantia with white flowers, although in my collection there were only varieties with blue, blue and purple flowers.

This is a plant for shady corners of the garden. In the sun it quickly fades and blooms for a short time. In hot weather, additional watering is required. In its homeland, in America, Tradescantia grows in moist areas of the tropical forest, so if you plant it in partial shade near a reservoir, then this plant will thank you with abundant and long flowering from June to September. If in the middle of summer, when the flowering weakens, the Tradescantia is cut, then it will again release shoots and bloom in the fall.

Tradescantia is propagated by seeds, dividing bushes and cuttings. Seeds are sown shallowly, you can directly into the ground. Some seedlings bloom by the end of the first summer. It is best to divide the bushes in the spring before the stems grow back, if the roots are long, they are shortened to 15 cm.

Propagation by stem cuttings with two or three internodes, in my opinion, is the simplest and most productive method. Such cuttings root easily and quickly throughout the summer. They can be rooted in soil or water.

They take root well in 2-3 weeks in micro-greens. And if planted at the beginning of summer, they winter well in the ground with a small shelter. In autumn, some of the young plants can be transplanted into flower pots and kept as indoor plants.

Anderson's Tradescantia is considered a frost-hardy plant. Some varieties can withstand frosts down to -34? С. I believe that this plant should still be covered for the winter, since a winter with little snow and frosty winter can damage some of the plants.

I have not seen any diseases or pests on Tradescantia. Spring yellowing of the leaves is sometimes observed, but fertilizing with fertilizers solves this problem.

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In my garden, Tradescantia mainly grows in the shade of trees along with hosts, but I also plant some of the plants in more illuminated areas, along with bells, loosestrife, undersized delphiniums or spurs.

Astrologers love this plant very much. They argue that if envious people live in your house or are often envious, start a tradescantia. All plants from this group do not allow the energy of envy to merge with the atmosphere and cause unexpected sharp pains in households and an influx of bad mood.