Still Dancing

I had never seen a fuchsia till we moved to the mountains. My old college friend Vicky Owen had one on her porch--creamy outer petals with a fuchsia colored center. It seemed to epitomize the beauty all around us-- wild day lilies, roses, honeysuckle, and a mimosa tree by their porch, covered in pink powder-puff blooms and swarming with humming birds.

That was the beginning of my love affair with fuchsias, those little ballerina-like flowers. In the early years I bought them hopefully and enjoyed them briefly only to watch them to succumb to drought, white fly, cold, and who knows what all.

For the past several years, Justin and Claui have been giving me big, beautiful fuchsia hanging baskets for Mothers Day and, at the risk of jinxing myself, I think I've found how to keep them alive.

Summer heat is deadly. I hang mine where they get morning sun only and then I water them every day, soaking the soil and wetting the foliage. Sometimes twice a day if they look wilty.

Come cold weather, I put them in my little unheated (we put in a space heater if the temps drop to freezing) greenhouse, up high and away from sunlight. and continue to keep them watered--though only when they dry out. 

Mostly they survive and are blooming right now. I even had luck with rooting a few cuttings. Oh, the joy!