Who has coral vine or queens wreath

I started some from seed and it seems to grow very very slow. Any tips I'm in very dry Arizona and it's hot here. Does anyone have other colors? I gave in and bought 2 pots of them. I may get another pot when we get back in town to fill in a hole I have. I'm trying to start a butterfly garden and the soil there is just horrible. I have to put in tons of horse manure to add more organic material.
How mulch cold can they take? Do you all mulch them over for the winter?
Mickey
Cave Creek, Arizona

Mickey, No answer for the plants but I have a question about the horse manure. Was this manure from a VERY old pile of composted manure? Horse manure can take years to compost into a useable product. Much longer than cow manure. If it is too fresh it can be very hot and do more damage than good to your plants.

I have the pink coral vine. It reseeds prolificly, to the point of invasiveness. If pulled early, they're easy to remove though. Mine are in a super hot spot in the yard, planted in about a 8" spot of soil surrounded by concrete. I do nothing special to them over winter, no mulch, nothing. We had prolonged freezing temps this past winter in the 20's and they still came back with no problem. They will easily grow 20 to 30 feet in a season. Mine winds up in the tops of oak trees. Hope this info helps.

Crow

Crow,
Your comments are very encouraging! Mine are growing sovery slowly but again this is the first year,it xould also be that it is over 100 degrees here and very dry.
I think I need t get some more seeds. When we get back I may buy another plant. Here we can only buy a pink but I have never seen it in bloom yet.
Mickey

I have to second Crow's Post. Once established they are there for good. Mine die back every winter but then come back every spring. I divided one and replanted it in another location and it did take a while to get established but now it is growing like crazy. I don't do anything to maintain them.
Lisa

My coral vine is blooming and has been for a while now. We've also been in drought conditions here in Houston and our temps are similar to yours. We've had a lot of days with temps at 100 or above. Your's may just not be well enough established yet to bloom. Mine usually freezes to the ground or I whack them back to the ground each winter, and they still get 30 feet of more of runners with blooms every year.

I'm assuming you've seen these in bloom. They are truly beautiful when they bloom, but if you keep it trimmed, you might not get any flowers. It blooms on the ends and they have a tendancy to run up something then the blooms hang down, similar to wisteria. Here's a close up pic of some of the blooms.

I am currently harvesting pink Coral Vine seeds. It grows wild here.

Send me a D-mail if interested.

This message was edited Sep 5, 2010 2:52 PM

first year they are slow while the roots establish, after that they will do fine, heat doesnt hurt them, just water a bit more often if you have decent drainage

I have same problem as Mickey( I live close to her too). Mine are one year old--deep pink and white colors. So far they show new growth only but no climbing. Infact, our nursery people complain that they are slow to wake up and as a result their 'selling season' is short.
Hi Crow,
may I ask how old your vine was before it started to leap?
thanks in advance

Our Southern coastal Texas area humidity is generally higher than yours in Az, this one returns every year faithfully, but didn't spurt til almost July-Aug. It isn't covering the trees yet either as we keep it climbing the little arbor school bus stop, and doubling back on itself, instead of a tree. I suspect being hugged to a tree creates a little bit extra growth protection. Some plants don't do as well seperated from the plants they are accustomed to growing around and do better 'abandoned' to their bad habits.

thankyou Kittriana. I think mine are very 'lonely only' right now. Will plan on getting them some neighbours.

There was an article I remember reading about mycorr-aaarrrgh-hoidizhal, symbiotic plant relationships... not necessarily the parasitic ones like mistletoe, etc, that was a definite plus in favor of plants living or plants living very well when paired in odd ways to their environmental partners. Not just 2 of the same, but like a legume growing side by side with a plant that benefitted from the resources the legume naturally maintained, and the article said also that this is usually a 1-way benefit... sorry if my lagging memory made that more complicated than necessary, hope it helps.


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SO, is Coral vine and Queens wreath the SAME thing? I have Coral vine but never heard it called queen's wreath.

http://www.ehow.com/how_2037792_care-coral-vine.html

diffrences of the two:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/54548/

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/2050/

looks like you could use this link:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/search.php?Search=Search+plants

hope it works for you