Growing Poinsettia In Romania

By Adina Dosan (adinamiti)
December 21, 2007

I never heard about poinsettia until 4 years ago, a week before Christmas. I saw a picture of poinsettia in a Romanian magazine and fell in love with it instantly! I told myself ”I have to buy me one of these!”…but I couldn’t have been more wrong! Poinsettias are very expensive in our country and I couldn’t possibly afford to buy one from the flowershop, so what was I to do? I wanted one poinsettia in my home, for Christmas, so badly!

I used to read this magazine called ”Practical ideas for the house, apartament and garden” which is similar to the Dave's Garden website… meaning , the readers write all the articles and send photos too. I’ve written many articles to this magazine too, about my plants or house and loved the idea of sharing my experience!

The article was about poinsettia (Euphorbia pulcherrima) and had been written by a lady who has been growing them for years and she had a few for selling. I called and asked if she still had one for me too…no, she didn’t have anymore for sale…ugh! That would have been hard on anyone, but not on me, no sir! If I want something, I do everything I can until I get it, even if it isn’t right away!

They say you have to take care what you wish for, because it may come true…and so it did for me! Later that day, a neighbor of mine came over and I was telling her about my wish and she said ”I can give you this plant, I have one at home!” My eyes were sparkling with joy…yipeeee!

“Only it has some white bugs on it, I don’t know what it is, maybe you can take care of it” I said ”Yes, yes, bring it over, I’ll see what I can do!”.

She brought me a branch and I began searching for all the articles about poinsettia I could find in the magazine. But first, I washed each leaf and the stem with water and soap, to get rid of the white bugs. Poor leaves looked like faded , but this didn’t discourage me!

I found an article about how to divide poinsettia and obtain more plants from cuttings. I did the same with my branch : cut it in 2, put each cutting in warm water, to stop the white liquid which was pouring from the cut and planted it in a pot. I put the pot in a sunny window and watered it only in the plate. The leaves faded, got yellow and fell within a week, but the stems was still green, so this told me I was on the right way.

One of the stems didn’t survive, but the other one grew so well I could trim it again in April and obtain another 2 cuttings ! In August I trimmed the plants again and had 4 more cuttings…7 poinsettias all in all ! I fertilized them every 2 weeks, until Christmas.

I began searching for more info about poinsettias, on the Internet and so I found Dave’s Garden, which changed my life and brought me so many wonderful and dear friends!

I went to the Plant Files section, clicked on Search plants and typed ”poinsettia”…everything I wanted was there! And so many pictures and threads, on which I could find information, from the DGers !

The mistakes I made with my poinsettias

I found out about having to keep poinsettia under a bag or a black cloth, beginning with the end of September,so they could have 12-14 hours of dark, which accelerates blooming. I covered them with black plastic bags, from 5 p.m to 8 a.m., from late September to mid December. This was a heavy task, because I had to be very careful not to touch the bracts and the little flowers, which were just growing. Meanwhile, my mom and a friend, to whom I gave poinsettias, didn’t go through all this trouble… they just let them stay in a sunny window and watered it from time to time.

Now, after a few years, I’ve realized I didn’t have to cover them at all, because we have enough dark, during winter, so the bracts can grow and get colored.

I made another huge mistake with my poinsettias, by bringing them inside from the balcony, where was too cold, although they had full sun, almost all day. In my livingroom, they were in complete shadow during winter, but I thought it would be warmer for them…that was so wrong ! The bracts appeared, but they weren’t as colorful as they should have been and some of them fell down. Still, I was so proud of my poinsettias!

I kept on fertilizing them, during the holidays, thinking they would grow better, if fertilized.

After the holidays, I took all of them on the balcony and, surprise… they started to bloom again and the bracts were so red, as shown in the picture(sorry for its quality!). This wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t fertilize them continuously ! They need a repause time after blooming.

What to do to your poinsettias after the holidays

• Keep it in the window and water it as usual.
• Don’t fertilize anymore until March !
• Trim back the branches which had bracts, this way the plant will regenerate.
• At the end of spring, replant poinsettia in a bigger pot, put it in a sunny window.
• When danger of freeze is gone, bring it outside, first in a shadow place, to acclimatize.
• Rotate the plant, periodically, so it can grow beautiful all around.
• Pinch it, to grow bushy, every 2 weeks or monthly, until mid August.
• Fertilize every week, from March to December, until the bracts are showing.
• If the room is too cold, the plant will bloom later; if too warm, the bracts will fall down quickly.

What to do to a poinsettia you get for Christmas

• Put it in a sunny window.
• Be sure no leaf touches the cold window.
• Water it when the soil gets dry on top.

Attention : High temps accelerates the fallen of the bracts !

I hope my advice will be of help to our DG friends, who will want to grow a poinsettia after the winter holidays !

Happy gardening!

About Adina Dosan   I'm a Romanian plants and pets addicted, always happy to share my experience.

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Subject Topic Starter Replies Views Last Post Good article doccat5 19 80 Dec 24, 2007 1:04 PM

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