Take care of your holiday plants and enjoy them the entire year

Holiday plants

From coastal to desert zones, we live in one of the most diverse areas in the United States when it comes to temperatures, soil types, plant varieties and insect populations. We sometimes take for granted being able to garden all year long, entertain outdoors most days of the year, and harvest fruit year-round in our own backyards.

Seasonal favorites

One popular plant for the holidays is the poinsettia. Typically we know the poinsettia as a wonderful gift that we purchase during this time of year to spruce up our entryway or enhance the fireplace mantel along with candles, garlands and stockings.

The poinsettia has become a holiday tradition that is now available in not only the traditional red but pink, white and yellow as well.

The flower of the poinsettia is not really a flower at all. The colored portion of the plant is actually a bract or modified leaf.

I bring up the following story because one of my customers told me that rather than throw away her holiday poinsettia she had planted it. The beautiful plant in the 6-inch pot soon became an overgrown 12-foot shrub in the backyard.

With the holidays right around the corner you may be buying or receiving live plants as gifts and it may be a good idea to know what can become of the plants after they are taken outside and stuck in the corner of the yard to be ignored. Here are a few plants that you may receive and some advice about how to care for them:

Poinsettia- not a great landscape plant. Don't expect to see the red tint on the leaves for very long if ever again. The plant has natural green leaves and the red is brought out by certain conditions maintained in the greenhouse for many months prior to shipping to the local nursery or home garden store. They can get very tall, up to 12 feet, and are very sticky when pruned. Their woody growth habit is also not very attractive.

Pine or fir trees- cute in the pot with a bow but if you take them outside give them plenty of room. Many varieties will grow well here. Just make sure you stake the tree throughout its young life to keep the trunk straight. If you don't, it will become a bush too big to control. Make sure you prune any girdled or circled roots before planting. Makes a nice long-term memory of a special Christmas.

Norfolk Island pine (Araucaria heterophylla)- These pseudofir looking trees have interesting layered branching and they grow like a weed. Not a typical landscape plant because it gets big. Very big. I have seen them 100 feet tall in Oxnard. They are unmistakable, however, with their unusual layered branches and light green needles. Give them plenty of room and stand back.

Chrysanthemums- common blooming potted plants that come in super fall colors and bloom like crazy. After they have lost their blooms plant them in a special spot in the landscape and mark the soil with a tag or stake.

Mums are perennials and when the temperature drops the plant will die off and go dormant. The stake will act as a reminder that you are waiting until spring for the plant to rise again. Mums will bloom over and over again and they make a great addition to the garden. Just a reminder

Whatever wonderful plant you receive for Christmas, just keep it away from space heaters or furnace vents. The warm air will dry up many plants and they may not recover. Additional watering won't help either.

If you need time to get the plants in the ground and don't want to keep them indoors, set them out on the patio and keep them moist until you are ready to plant them. The cold, moist air will give them a better chance of survival.

Ron Reichl is the owner of Metro Landscape in Simi Valley. He is a landscape contractor and certified nurseryman and pesticide applicator and a graduate of and former horticulture instructor at Michigan State University. Call him at (805) 857-0616.