PlantFiles: Brazilian Plume Flower
Justicia carnea 'Huntington'

A beautiful plant that attracts hummingbirds. I have the yellow species, Justicia aurea, as well.
It grows well here in the full sun in Costa Rica, without additional water even during dry season.
Starts easily from cuttings.

I have cut mine numerous times to root cutting for others and it grows back very quickly. It is November now and it is still in full bloom. Last winter we had a freeze which killed my lantana's and hybiscus, but it did not harm the Justicia. Perhaps because it is next to the house. I am careful to feed it every two weeks with a liquid fertilizer. I just love it!

I've had this growing successfully out of doors here in coastal S. W. England for a couple of years. It is grown in dappled shade, which protects it from frosts on clear winter nights. The form I have has glossy deep green leaves that are flushed purple beneath as opposed to the downy, grey-green leaved form. It retains all of its top growth and tends to be semi-evergreen, but needs fairly rigorous pruning to prevent 'legginess'. This Justicia responds well to regular deep watering and (liquid) feeding throughout the summer and produces its very large 'plumes' of intense, deep pink flowers from August onwards in our climate.

I found a branch of this plant at the local greenwaste recycling site and brought it home. It was very wilted, but I took several 6" cuttings and threw them into a bucket of water for, I think, about 2 hours; they were revived and healthy looking and I dipped them into rooting horomone powder and stuck them. They looked sad for a week, then took. They finally bloomed and I was able to use this site for ID. They are spectacular with their green-maroon bracts and pure pink flowers.

My grandmother has had this plant gorwing in her greenhouse for over 20 yars. It has 'limbs' that are six feet long...however it does nto seem to root itself. Some of the limbs lie on the floor of the greenhouse floor in the dirt and it has never rooted. I am attempting to root it via various methods, but am not overly positive of hwat results I will have.

My grandmother always called it a pink hyacinth, so I had to post it on the ID Forum to find out what it really is. It has ben really hardy in zone 8a in a greenhouse. If I can get it rooted it will be itnerestign to see how it does in the real world.

Meanwhile, it is STUNNING!

I have only seen this plant once in a nursery. Thankfully I purchased 2! I had them in separate pots for 2 years in dappled sun, although they seem to not mind full sun, but not for the full day. They get pretty ratty by mid winter, but cutting them back severely has forced all new growth to appear. The flower clusters are impressive and are quite novel. I used to bring them in on nights we expected a light frost, but they seem to hold their own, but then it rarely goes below 30 here in Phx during the winter. They do seem to like a lot of water, but again are surprisingly resilient!