Cold-Hardy Tropicals Add Flare
Yearning for a bit of tropical color in your garden, but frigid winters make it impossible? Cold-hardy tropical plants are the answer.
April 24, 2009
Courtesy Logee’s and Schultz Communications
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Passiflora incarnata 'Maypop' shows off its delightfully fragrant blooms.
courtesy Logee's
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Tropical plants are popping up in botanical gardens with increasing frequency, as garden designers use unusual plants to add dashes of color and flare to otherwise ordinary gardens. That’s fine for the lucky folks in Florida and Southern California, where nighttime temperatures rarely get close to freezing.
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But what about the rest of us who deal with frigid winters? Tropical plants are, well, tropical. They do not like cold weather. If left in the ground to overwinter, the typical tropical plant will die a quick and permanent death. And who has time to dig up delicate tropical plants each fall and baby them all winter long so they can be replanted next spring?
That’s where cold-hardy tropical plants can come to the rescue.
It may sound like an oxymoron, but cold-hardy tropicals really do exist. According to Byron Martin, co-owner of Logee’s Tropical Plants (www.logees.com), there are several varieties of plants that are thought of as “tropical” that can easily survive USDA Zone 5 and 6 winters.
“Tropical plants can give a garden a unique look and feel,” Martin says. “Cold-hardy tropical plants offer visual interest and variety with the added benefit of being tolerant of most winter climates. There is nothing quite as wonderful as introducing the large leaves, vibrant flowers and delicious fruits of tropical plants into a North American garden.”
Martin’s list of must-have cold-hardy tropical plants for American gardens includes the seven plants described below. “Don’t be afraid to plant something new,” encourages Martin. “It’s time to go beyond petunias and mums.”
Passiflora incarnata ‘Maypop’
Passion Flowers are delightfully exotic, with showy flowers that nearly shout out their tropical heritage. But ‘Maypop’ Passion Flower is actually native to North America, and it can handle a tough Zone 5 winter and come back strong the next spring. Like all Passion Flowers, ‘Maypop’ is easy-to-grow, and its vining habit can be trained to cover a trellis or climb up a fence or pole. Delightfully fragrant, 3-inch wide flowers with creamy pinkish lavender petals in a fully banded corolla appear throughout the summer. The flowers develop into succulent fruit. This is the hardiest of the Passion Flowers, growing successfully as far north as New England. Each plant in a 2.5-inch pot sells for $11.95 from www.logees.com.
Musa basjoo (Hardy Banana)
Imagine growing tropical bananas in your outdoor garden in Chicago or Philadelphia or Kansas City – or even as far north as New England (Zone 4!). With this Hardy Banana you’ll get a defining tropical look. And, yes, with proper mulching, this tough plant can withstand temperatures below zero. This extremely vigorous banana grows several feet tall in a single season and in time forms large clumps that can reach up to 13 feet in height. Also known as the Japanese Fiber Banana, Musa basjoo makes a fine container specimen. If grown inside, it is easy to grow and will tolerate varying conditions of temperature and light with ease. Although it does produce bananas, they are not edible. Simple to grow, give it plenty of water, fertilizer and sunlight. A plant in a 4-inch pot sells for $19.94.
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