Showing posts with label Campsis Radicans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Campsis Radicans. Show all posts

Thursday 30 October 2014

Hummingbird’s Favourite Flower Trumpet Vine or Campsis Radicans



Trumpet vine is a perfect example of a hummingbird plant. Its red orange two to three inch, trumpet shaped flowers, which bloom in mid-July have evolved along with the long, slender bill of the hummingbird, which pollinates them. Even the color, the hummingbird’s favorite, is designed to attract this bird. The vine clings with aerial rootlets and is very large and heavy. Although if you’ve a massive masonry chimney for it to grow on, you might need to wire it for additional support, and make sure the roots do not cling to the house if it is made of wood. An easier place to grow it is on a free standing masonry wall or over a rock pile. 

If you do not have a suitable spot and want a good hummingbird vine, grow trumpet honeysuckle instead. A hybrid, Campsis radicans x tagliabuana “Madam Galen” has even showier flowers. Both are hardy to Zone four to five. Chinese trumpet vine (C. Grandiflora) has large flowers but is hardy only to zones seven to eight. In warm climates trumpet vines can be invasive, but they are useful if you want to cover a lot of hare ground in a hurry.

How to Grow

Grow trumpet vine in full sun in moderately fertile, moist, well-drained soil. Prune it on top in winter or early spring as needed to lighten it and improve its appearance, especially if it is very heavy on top; you don’t want the flowers and the hummingbirds to be too high for you to see and top pruning will encourage new bottom growth. Propagate by layering, by removing and replanting suckers, from stem cuttings or from seed.