Goldfish Plant
Interesting Facts about the Goldfish Plant. Just imagine having a Goldfish Plant in your garden, a beautiful flowering plant that literally has flowers that look almost identical to real goldfish. This whimsical plant adds a nice pop of deep orange reddish color. The stems are wiry and hanging and in fact, some can grow to three feet long while carrying blooms of three inches long.
The Goldfish Plant is a perennial, which means it is planted once and then in the winter, it goes into hibernation. Come springtime, the plant automatically comes out of dormancy so new blooms can be enjoyed. Originally, the Goldfish Plant came from Panama in Costa Rica but today, it grows all over the world. The great thing about this plant is that it can be grown in a garden, greenhouse, in a container on the deck, or even indoors.
The Goldfish Plant has a main feature, being the blooms because this plant does not produce foliage as many other perennials do. Although the blooms are vibrant and beautiful to look at, they do not produce any fragrance. However, consider that this particular plant needs very little care to grow, it is well worth adding to your outdoor flowerbed or garden or displayed indoors.
Even the temperature in which the Goldfish Plant grows is varied since it does amazingly well between 60 and 85 degrees. However, this plant prefers areas with high humidity so states such as Florida and Missouri are ideal growing locations. Regarding sun, this plant loves bright but indirect sunlight, which should be coming out of the South, East, or West, never the North.
For the healthiest Goldfish Plant, you should use a rich potting soil, one that is formulated to retain water but also soil that easily drains. One of the best types of soil is called the African violet mix but to save money, you could always make your own mixture. For this, you would need to blend one part of sphagnum moss, one part of peat moss, and one part of perlite. When using the Goldfish Plant in a container, make sure it has a drain hole in the bottom.
To water this type of plant, again, the soil should be kept moist, especially during the growing season. Then in the non-growing season, you want to allow the soil to almost dry out completely before watering again. Although a little challenging when grown outdoors, the Goldfish Plant seems to like warm water much better than cooler water that comes from the garden hose. Additionally, this plant needs water soluble fertilizer on a weekly basis but during the growing season, the fertilizer needs to be lime-free.
It is important that when you purchase a new Goldfish Plant that you carefully inspect it for any insects. This plant is prone to problems of mites, aphids, and mealy bugs so prior to planting outdoors or bringing the plant indoors, it is essential the plant be insect-free. If you find insects, we suggest you use an organic pesticide or you could place the plant outdoors and spray it off with a mixture of one part mild dishwashing soap such as Dove or Palmolive and three parts water, taking care to get the underside of any blooms.
