The Yellow Farmhouse Garden

December 10, 2007

This Year’s Poinsettia Varieties

It’s been a while since I last posted an article here, but that doesn’t mean that things have slowed down in the garden and greenhouse.

Christmas is just around the corner, so for us that means Poinsettias are the focus of our work.  Actually, the poinsettias have been in the greenhouse since September.  As a result, here in the greenhouse, Christmas has slowly crept up since that time. We’ve watched them grow from small, green cuttings to full colorful plants.

Greenhouse Poinsettias

We’ve been so used to the greenhouse being full of Poinsettias, that it’s hard to believe that they will all be gone soon.

Some of the plants have already been given away last week.

Many people are not aware that there are different Poinsettia varieties, just like there are different varieties of tomatoes.  Through the years, plant breeders have developed varieties for not only color, but, also growth habit (short or tall), leaf shape (smooth or lobed), maturity date (early, mid, or late) and other characteristics.

One very important development in  Poinsettia breeding is the ease of production.  The old varieties needed to be covered with a black shade cloth during a period of their life cycle.  Any light, even from street lamps at night, could cause the crop to fail to bloom.

Fortunatly, this is not as critical anymore.

This year, we are growing three varieties of Poinsettias.

Premium Red Poinsettia

Premium Red is our main crop, we have about 150 of those.

Sonora White

Sonora is our white variety, there’s about 40 of them.

Marblestar Poinsettia

Marblestar is a pink and white variety.  We have about 50 of those.

Greenhouse Poinsettias  of Almost all of our Poinsettias are grown in 6″ pots, except for a couple  dozen 10″ pots.

In two weeks time the greenhouse will be empty of Poinsettias except for a few that we will continue to grow. A couple will be saved for taking cuttings for next year’s crop, while a few more will be left to grow into larger plants for Christmas of 2008.

Bob

1 Comment »

  1. The pointsettias are beautiful. I have a hard time keeping them alive once I get them, though. The leaves seem to fall off pretty quickly. I sure like them and I like to give them as gifts.

    Comment by victoria mcintyre — December 14, 2007 @ 1:54 pm

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