Discussing my Coleus...the plant of Gods!

I will be adding images to this discussion soon but right now, my focus is on talking about the growing love for coleus. I chanced upon this plant last year. At that time, I did not understand the difference between foliage plants and flowering plants. Soon, along with my love for the plant, a bit of knowledge also seeped in. Within a few months, I realized that the coleus family is rather high on color combinations and bright, colored leaves but does not flower. Yes, sometimes you get some seed stalks but these are not really pretty. This is a means to create some seeds that can be preserved for restarting the pot after the winter has ravaged it.

Yes, the coleus is vulnerable to extreme winters. Foliage plants like coleus cannot survive the extreme nip in the air and similarly, they cannot tolerate very high temperatures. You have to find the shady spots in your living space. But the coleus is not a window plant. It is not meant to grow in spaces where some rays of the sun visit for a few minutes during the day. These beautiful plants need an open, airy, and somewhat shady space. In my house, I have some cover on the balconies, and the area underneath is largely shielded from the sun. This is almost perfect for any type of coleus. Guard against overprotecting the plant. Though the stalks don't look very robust, they have reasonable strength. They can survive the heavy monsoon shower but heavy winds can do some damage. The Coleus is best grown as a combination. Think of one planter that has the pink stripe, maroon vein, leafy green, and the popular purple variety growing together.

My experiments with the coleus and some well-learned lessons now span almost a year. I have learned that constantly nipping and pruning the plant is critical to ensure it continues to grow. Most coleus plants will grow vertically and then, they start stooping. You have to protect against this inherent nature of the plant. You have to nip and prune as many times as you visit the balcony. There is never too much pruning of coleus. This plant needs manual intervention to prevent the long stalking and branching tendency. This inspires the plant to grow horizontally and bush out a lot more. That is exactly what you want - bushy coleus plants that are dense and look like a shrub of colored leaves. The foliage does not change its color patterns a lot over the months. The colors can run from weak and mild to very pronounced during the monsoon season. This is a wonderful plant to own if you like pruning if you have the knack of using the scissors often in a garden. I recommend this plant to all those folks who are discovering gardening and want to learn all the basics in one plant. This includes preparing for the winters, watering, protecting against too much sun, pruning, and feeding the plant. With one planter of coleus, you get to easily propagate the plant across the entire garden.

Stem cuttings are easy to procure from the growing plant. You just cut them a few inches above the ground or from the top and stick them into wet soil. Within three days, the stem cutting starts to find life, getting more upright with each passing day. However, all stem cuttings might not work. Cuttings that are too thick or those that have been supporting the aging, over-mature leaves might not get the job done. This is why shaving off the leaves from the stem is a good idea. You can leave a couple of leaves at the top and everything else has to be pruned/removed.

The road ahead for me suggests getting my hands on the lesser-known varieties of the coleus. This includes the bright orange-colored variety that I usually refer to as the fiery coleus apart from a few that have deep-dark purple veins. Jim's holiest of coleus - this channel on YouTube is broadcast from the US and some of these rare types of coleus are found there. Yes, getting a few of these seeds from an overseas location like Pennsylvania just might work!

Update: June 2024

The Summer season in Delhi has been an absolute killer in terms of the heat waves that have been unrelenting. More so, the heat has been accompanied by strong, hot winds that seem to flow in from all directions. As a result, even the night-time temperature in Delhi, like many other parts of northern India, has been at a historic high. Collectively, these things have taken a toll. Largely, my collection of Coleus stands nullified. I don't have the heart to share the images and honestly, I did not have the inclination of clicking a lot as my favorite plant met its premature death. I should be saying this with plurality as not one, but nearly 10 of them were laid to rest, thanks to the 2024 Delhi summer season which has tortured the city folks and has been as severe on the plants too. I see balconies filled with scorched, half-burnt, and fully destroyed plants and despite the green sheets and other desperate attempts to create a protective shield, they have not helped us. With the monsoon season around the corner, I just might buy a few more to get a batch started but this time, the sense of losing the Coleus is much deeper...

Change Underway...

Lately, I have planted a lot of cacti, and largely, they are doing well. My logic for choosing cactus over repeatedly trying to raise other tropical plants in Delhi was the gardening challenges that seemed peculiar to my home. The sun seems to be absent for about 3 months, sending us back to the time when Dracula eventually took over Transylvania, and during the hot season, the sun's rays hit us at such an angle that you could ripen up a mango within an hour. Thanks to this extreme, many of our balcony plants in Delhi have curled up, dried, fought hard, and then, submitted. Bringing up a cactus has been somewhat easier at least in terms of not worrying about the thermal energy in abundance at this time of the year burning up the leaves.