Perilla frutescens

Hi gardeners, I'm new to the forum, this is my first post. I'm interested in rare and interesting plants, ethnobotanicals, herbs and spices.

I'm growing red and green Shiso (perilla) this year and was wondering if anyone has collected seed from the red and green varieties side by side. I'm assuming they will cross and produce mixed offspring, but do you still get pure red and pure green out of these crosses? Do I need to cover some of the flowers with an insect barrier to keep the pure varieties going?

Hope you all get just the right balance of sunshine and rain on your gardens :-)
melangemerchant

So far I've grown just the red variety. A Japanese-Canadian neighbour gave me a plant. In this zone it's just an annual, but seeds really freely. I've never been able to catch the seeds but would like to if only to attempt to control where they go in the garden. Any ideas?

Ann

Hi Ann, I have the same problem, they seem to self seed very prolifically and at random. I just weed out the ones that are in inconvenient places and keep the ones that happen to fall in the right place. If you were serious about catching the seed you would cut the stems when they start to dry out and hang them upside down with a paper bag over the flower heads. Melange.

I have grown the red and green together and have had in-between colors result. I haven't tested the seed from one of the in-betweens to see what results. They just all reseed where they are.

It would be interesting to see what the f2 generation would produce.

I have the curly red (crispa) Perilla but on occasion I'll see a flat-leafed form spring up.

Robert.

This summer we had a green plant growing near by the red ones. I'll keep people posted what the progeny are like. I too have noticed an occasional very crinkly 'crispate' one but the bulk of the plant I get germinating are flat leaved and very deep purple, with a red iridescence on the leaves, as pictured above.