Here's what I love about this plant:
1. I call it a "Perennial" - It's a very hearty vine that you can plant in the spring, and it will start to wither when the first freeze rolls into town. It produces beautiful purple flowers that look like miniature orchids, that turn into seed pods...which are edible! And when I say make I mean after your first vine, you will have enough seeds to plant 6 vines every spring for the rest of your life. :)
2. It's fancy sciency name I can't remember, but it translates to "friendship vine" probably because of the abundance of seed pods you get every year. So if someone strolls by your home and says "oh, what a beautiful vine you have" you can share some seeds, and make a friend. I gave some seeds to my mail-lady, and we are buds. :)
3. It is not a brick crawler, only a wrap-around-er. Which means if you have a brick home, even if you plant it near your house it will not invade the brick. You can control where it grows by training it around a trellis or fence. I started mine on a trellis then added long sticks for it to climb onto as it grew larger.
4. This vine is definitely for those of us who like to see alot of growth in a short amount of time - it grows pretty quickly and very large; both tall and wide. Mine was around 6 1/2 feet tall and probably 10-12 feet wide. When we took the picture below it hadn't reached it's full girth yet, but you can see how tall it was - whatahusband is about 6' 2". I had to trim mine back quite a bit because it was reaching out to grab my rain gutters. I always thought it would look beautiful growing all over a backyard fence. Maybe that's what I'll do this year!
I started the seeds for this season's vine about 4 days ago, and they're already sending out shoots...
1 comment:
i want some!! i can plant them along our chain-link fence! miss you. hope to see you next week over my spring break
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