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Re: Sesbania punicea

On Fri, 17 Jul 1998 Judy Showers wrote:

>I am looking for places on the www with information on Sesbania punicea
>(Daubentonia punicea) or Scarlet Wisteria.  Any help would be
>appreciated. Am also looking for seeds for this plant. Thanks again,

I used to grow this as a cool greenhouse shrub years ago.  It is very
easily raised from seed, flowering within a few months.  Eventually,
it can form a small, rather untidy tree although there is no doubt
that when covered with its scarlet pea-flowers, it is decidedly
handsome and the bright green, long pinnate leaves more than help
atone for any wayward nature of the plant.  My plants were grown in
large containers and trained up the sides of a cold greenhouse where
they flowered throughout most of the year.

Seed should be sown 1cm. deep in any sterile seed compost and
germinated at 23 - 25C.  Germination takes anywhere between 10 - 30
days, depending upon the freshness of the seed.  Seedlings can be
potted up into 10cms pots as soon as they are large enough to handle
and watered carefully until well established. Pot on to larger
containers as necessary.  This species does not appear to be unduly
difficult where soil is concerned, but I had excellent results using a
good, well-drained, loam based compost.  However, the plant is highly
intolerant of poor drainage and sour conditions at the root.  Growth
is quite rapid and a six month old plant will be well over 30cms high
with the first flower buds showing.  Keep in a bright sunny spot and
maintain temperatures above 5C for best results.  Although Sesbania
can probably withstand light frost, especially if kept dry at the root
(mine came through minus 3C remarkably well), I suspect zone 6 is just
that bit too cold.  I would estimate it to be more suitable for zones
9a and above.

Sesbania punicea freely self sets its own seed and once you have it,
you should be self sufficient for a very long time.  That said, I no
longer have it and would love to try outside in my garden here in the
far south west of the UK (zone 9b but no sun!).  So if anyone out
there has a few seeds and would like to swap them for something else,
I'd be interested to hear.

David Poole
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