 |
Leonotis nepetifolia |
 |
| Synonym(s) |
Phlomis nepetifolia |
| Common name |
annual lion's tail |
| Family |
lamiaceae |
| Life cycle |
annual |
| Flowers |
orange |
| Size |
4-6' |
| Light |
sun |
From seed  |
germinate at room temperature or slightly warmer
detailed seed-starting info below
|
| Seed ripens | mid-August |
When I started these from seed, I thought I was getting L. leonurus - a tender perennial. I wasn't sure how much they would do in one season of growth - I'm no good at keeping tropicals alive through winter. As it turns out, they were this annual species, and they performed just fine in their single season of growth. By mid-June, the green pineapple buds already showed there would be flowers soon - and by early July the bold orange flowers showed themselves. The flowers fade a bit after a week, taking on a less vivid color but otherwise hanging in there for a bit longer. After the first flush of bloom, the plants, already about 4 foot tall, toppled over and I mostly forgot about them. Which made their re-appearance later in summer a nice surprise: the fallen stalks had rooted at various places, and sent new vertical flowering stems up. With the improved base support, these stayed upright through the rest of the season. Certainly a worthwhile addition to our garden - I collect and start seed every year now (they will not sustain a self-seeding population in our zone 6 garden). The square stem typical of the mint family
|
| | Still sprucing up the garden in winter |
|
|
This plant used to grow in our garden, but it slipped away... About my plant portraits
PlantLinks to other web pages about Leonotis nepetifolia
Visitors to this page have left the following comments| Leonotis Nepetifolia | Feb 06, 2010 | Your plant is misidentified. L. leonurus' foliage is lanceolate the specimen identified *is not*. This is clearly evident by the prefluorescent/transition stage foliage.
Right you are. I've updated my page - thanks. |
| Andrew Dougan | Apr 10, 2010 | I find the best way to start lion's tail,ear or any species of the wild dagga plant type its easier to just plant germinating them in jiffy pellets. they should come up in at least a week. |
| Lorraine Winfield | Apr 13, 2010 | I'm glad I found your site - I planted the leonotis nepetafolia seeds indoors in the spring of 2009, they germinated and grew quickly, and once danger of frost was past, I planted them in several different spots in my zone 6 PA garden. Although they grew over 6' tall, they never flowered.
I'm trying again this year (planted this weekend and keeping indoors under lamps as I did last year) and they started germinating already. Do you have any thoughts as to how I can encourage and ensure that they bloom this time?
Thanks
Mine have bloomed in both part-day and full-day sun exposure, in moderate-quality soil. If your soil is too fertile, perhaps the plant puts too much energy into growing instead of blooming. |
| Jade | Oct 16, 2011 | I can't find any specific directions on harvesting and using this beautiful plant(I have one in my garden that I need to harvest as it will frost soon). I read that the flower is the part most used, but there are just a few blooms coming out of the large pod.should the pod be used too? And I read that some people use the leaves. Also, that the flowers are traditionally smoked, but can also be made into tea. Same with the leaves? Can any of this be tinctured? Thanks |
- Seed from '06 trade. Baggy 70F (15d; 5%G, 5d) - 75F (10d; 10%G, 4d)
- Seed from '07 garden. Baggy 75F (47+%G, 3-6d)
- Seed from '07 garden. Baggy 75F (90+%G, 2-5d)
- Seed from '09 garden. Baggy 75F (82%G, 2-6d)
I welcome comments about my web pages; feel free to use the form below to
leave feedback about this particular page. For the benefit of other visitors
to these pages, I will list any relevant comments you leave, and if
appropriate, I will update my page to correct mis-information. Faced with an
ever-increasing onslaught of spam, I'm forced to discard any comments including
html markups. Please submit your comment as plain text. If you have a
comment about the website as a whole, please leave it in my
guestbook. If you
have a question that needs a personal response, please
e-mail me.
|
