Erythrina Christa Galli

[meanie]

Does anyone have any experience of growing this in a pot?
I've found people who have got them to flower in the ground, but they've lost them to the cold wet winters. My specimen has yet to flower in the two summers that I've owned it, which may have been down to it's susceptibility to red spider mite. So it's now out of its winter rest in the garage and has put on 45cm of growth in a little over three weeks. At the weekend it'll be put into its new 75 litre(ish) pot.
I'll be keeping it in the conservatory until the very height of summer, and hopefully I'll have enough humidity this year to keep the spider mite at bay.
So I have a couple of questions; Firstly what soil should I use? My second question is about feeding - what kind of NPK ratios should I be looking at?
They've got it to bloom in a pot at Oxfords botanic gardens in about the same sized pot, so I'll be trying to find out more there, but all help, as ever, is greatly appreciated.

[Ezeiza]

It is a native tree here and we have two superb specimens at the entrance. It is an aquatic tree in the wild, with the roots always in water. In summer if rainfall is not abundant it bears whitefly and some mealybugs. It is a tree with very thick bark (that can be removed to use as a medium for orchids or bromeliads).

Our native soils are very rich and have good content of N and K, but Phosphorus is in very low , insufficient quantities. Soil is clayey although with high organic matter content. It occurs in zones 11 to 9 b (in this you have to protect the young trees with cardboard or fleece for several seasons until they form bark and from then on they are truly hardy (HERE).

Always found in full sun and shed the leaves for the winter. Something very curious is that leaves' petioles are "articulated" and as a result after strong winds all leaves point in the same direction as if the foliage had been "combed".

Seed must be sown as it falls although it will germinate in the spring. This is peculiar of many plants from this part of the world (the pampas of Argentina). In other words, it can not be stored dry as the loss of embryos is huge.

Although the vermillion form is usually known there are pink, salmon, dark red, scarlet and bicolors forms, some really stunning. I like most the pink with dark red base form, very striking. I am not sure that they come true to variety in a 100%.

Hope this is of use

[meanie]

Thank you Ezeiza, that was very helpful.
I was aware that they had a high water requirement, but did not realise that they liked their "feet in water". That's causing a bit of a rethink.
Interesting too your comments about protecting the younger plants - makes me feel that I'm correct to be cautious with mine and to continue its pot growing regime.
With regards to feeding then, am I correct in thinking that tomato feed would be a good choice? I use a 4-4-8 tomato feed on my Daturas that I grow as annuals here with spectacular results.
What sort of temperatures do you get at the height of summer? Even with the doors and windows open, my conservatory will hit 35 centigrade in summer.
Once again, thank you.

[Ezeiza]

Glad to know that. I am wondering if you can not simply build a "pond" permanently filled with water for the warm season with a piece of plastic and a few bricks under the pot, to be dismantled in autumn.

We used to have zone 9 b winters but now we have a very long warm season, up to 5 months long and this amount for the extraordinary development of warm climate plants (years ago we had four well defined seasons, now two). We can be over 34 C for many weeks. Something most important I missed to mention is that humidity is very high at all seasons, around 70% or more. The spider mite atack is due to dry growing conditions. You can control them easily by spraying with methylated spirits.

Tomato fertilizers are of course excellent butif you accept my advice use them as a foliar feeding and not in waterings. There is a lot of blockade by the soil and you will get a distorted vision of what the plant is really receiving. Foliar feeding takes really dilute doses for the plants to take full benefit but on the other side they use most of what it is provided.

Up northe where the trees are most abundant, it is even hotter and they enjoy practically subtropical conditions therefore high temperatures would not be a problem at all.

[meanie]

Once again, thank you!
With regards to foliar feeding (which fits in well with the misting regime that I'm employing), how often would I need to do this?
I used an organic pest control last summer which resulted in the plant loosing all it's leaves, taking several weeks before I saw any reasonable new growth.
I have a large black plastic tray which I have filled with the darkest pebbles that I can buy - hopefully, when filled and topped up with warm water this will provide plenty of humidity for the conservatory.
Thank you for your help on this.

[Ezeiza]

Regarding the organic pest control, may I keep comments for myself. Alcohol is organic, kills at once all sorts of bugs, even cockroaches and leaves no residues of any kind.

There has to ne an adjustement in every case but we foliar fertilize our collection fortnighlty. We have adjusted the dose to one full teaspoon to 14 litres of water which is a considerable dilution. It is under our conditions excellent and supplied the nutrient needs of all sorts of plants under our conditions. We could increase teh frequency but have many plants and this has worked so far. Tomato fertilizer is very good and even better some fromula with all microelements.

[meanie]

Your comments regarding the organic pest control are probably similar to mine! Of the three plants that were affected, two reacted badly to it.

Thanks for your help on the fertilizer - I'll start with that ratio and frequency.

[Ezeiza]

To increase the evaporating surface in your tray you can add several bricks on their sides (on their edges).

[Tim Ingram]

We grew this years ago outside in Kent but it didn't start to flower until very late into the year and then was cut back by the autumn frosts. Madrona nursery, who are near to us, grow a dwarf form which is especially well suited to growing in a pot. I've heard there are some herbaceous species in the southern US, known as plough-breakers because of their substantial rootstocks. I found it took ages to file through the seedcoat before sowing them-but germination is very good.

[meanie]

Ezeiza - sorry for not acknowledging your last reply. Not sure how that happened.
Tim - that's an interesting looking nursery!
Over the last four weeks mine has passed the two metre mark. Could you tell me where the racemes form so that I know where to look. I have something definitely happening on one of the leaf axils.