Ep. 158 All about Poinsettias: Myths, legends, how they’re grown, and more | #GoodGrowing
Welcome to the Good Growing Podcast. I am Chris Enroth, horticulture educator with University of Illinois Extension coming at you from Macomb, Illinois, and we have got a great show for you today. We're gonna be diving into the myths and legends of holiday plants, and we are going to start with the poinsettia. And you know I'm not doing this by myself. I am joined as always every single week by horticulture educator Ken Johnson in Jacksonville.
Chris Enroth:Hey, Ken.
Ken Johnson:Hello, Chris. 'Tis the season.
Chris Enroth:It here be the season where we talk like pirates. So I I this is like, we think of gardening and all of that stuff happening in spring and summer and trailing off in the fall. But when it comes to the industrial complex of horticulture, it's really in full swing come December time. I mean, like, for one, I got a live Christmas tree this year. That's a whole industry, the live trees.
Chris Enroth:So we're we're pretty stoked about having our first live tree. I grew up with them, but for for as a family, little kids and all now, first time we've ever had one.
Ken Johnson:Yep. We still got the artificial.
Chris Enroth:So Sorry, Ken. Someday.
Ken Johnson:You don't wanna put it on the deck.
Chris Enroth:You I'll I'll crush you some some of the bows off of mine, and you can smell them. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Get some of that that pine berries.
Chris Enroth:We we do we have an Austrian pine that we picked out this year. It's very good. I I do like the Austrian pine. I would never plant one in my yard, but I will put one in my house. It's got nice, strong branches, holds up those ornaments really well.
Chris Enroth:The farm we went to, they also had a couple different types of fir trees, and the fir trees that true to their name, have a softer needle, but they don't hold the the ornaments as as strong as the Austrian pine does. Well, it's
Ken Johnson:a little more pliable.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. Yeah.
Ken Johnson:Soft softer branches.
Chris Enroth:Yes. Yes. The the Austrian pine, you know, they they're pumped up. They have lots of pumpitude, and so they're very strong. Hear me now and believe me later.
Chris Enroth:So that's that's the benefit of Austrian pine.
Ken Johnson:It's get a blue spruce.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. They look pretty. Alright. Wait. So Colorado blue spruce, Austrian pine, they look beautiful in the house as a Christmas tree.
Chris Enroth:Outside, they get every disease known to humankind. So don't put them in your yard. Oh, goodness. Well, Ken, yes, it it is the season. And today, we're gonna talk all about poinsettias.
Chris Enroth:Now I say poinsettia. How do you pronounce it?
Ken Johnson:Depends on the day. Usually, poinsettia.
Chris Enroth:But Poinsettia.
Ken Johnson:If it motivates me, it's poinsettia. Yeah. So I don't know what the proper way is or if there is a proper way.
Chris Enroth:I don't think there is a proper way. We we could maybe go back in time and ask the first person that that coined that name, which we're gonna dive into today. And but I I I will just say I've had a a really good time diving into this particular plant. And we had had mentioned this maybe in in a previous podcast long time ago, But Poinsettia, like the Christmas tree industry, I mean, it's its own market. There are people who grow Poinsettias in the world, and that's all they do to sell them one month out of the year.
Chris Enroth:And so it's it it is huge from a horticultural standpoint.
Ken Johnson:Wasn't it the the most widely grown or sold houseplant?
Chris Enroth:Yes.
Ken Johnson:And and you buy it for a couple weeks out of the year is when you can find it.
Chris Enroth:It it's the only time you can find it. And it is not native to The United States, but it is native to another part of North America. So we're gonna dive into this. So, Ken, could you kick us off what where does Poinsettia even come from if it's kinda North American but really south of there?
Ken Johnson:Yep. So it's native to Mexico going down into into Central America. So I think kind of that Mexico City area and then further south, at least that's my understanding. Definitely Mexico and further south. And it was you know, the Aztecs used it.
Ken Johnson:They used it as a dye, out of the red. They used the sap. I think it was to treat fevers and stuff. They used it as medicinal. And some I don't remember what group it was, but the what we call poinsettia, they call Quitla Chauche.
Ken Johnson:So that would be a more, I guess, indigenous name for it other than than Poinsettia or Poinsettia. So Throw another reading. Another name in there.
Chris Enroth:I I I need to keep going over this name in my head. From what I read, it was the Aztec name that they gave it, but I don't know if there's there were other indigenous peoples there that were also around. So, I will get that right eventually. And it stands for the flower that withers, which it's very sad. But it is so true of all flowers.
Chris Enroth:Yes. So native.
Ken Johnson:And I think I think in nowadays, you know, in Mexico, it's La Flor de Noche Bueno Noche Buena, which is the Christmas Eve flower or Christmas flower. So it's not just poinsettia, poinsettia. There's a lot of different names out there. I think I came across an article. Don't remember where all the names were.
Ken Johnson:Should have written them down. But even I mean, there's dozens more. Apparently, aren't as widely used nowadays, but back in the day Yeah. So to speak, were.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. I should've I should've wrote those down because even in The United States, this plant had a few other names which have as soon as I heard them, I immediately forgot them that when they were mentioned. So it's just the this is the nature of living in the modern day world with the Internet, with information at your fingertips. You don't have to ever memorize anything. Exactly.
Chris Enroth:Yes. Well alright. So they have all these names, different names. How in the world did it get this name Poinsettia or Poinsettia? Ken, was there a individual responsible for this particular name?
Ken Johnson:There was at least it's person that's attributed to is Joel Poinsett who was the minister, what we would now call ambassador to Mexico. I think he was the first one from The United States to Mexico. And he is credited with kinda discovering it and sending it off to United States. I believe it was Philadelphia. They sent it off.
Ken Johnson:I think was cuttings and that grew it and, you know, it it turned into what it is today. But definitely not a probably not the best legacy, at least, in in Mexico for for him, though. So
Chris Enroth:But and, you know, the interesting thing with with plant names is I was taught in school that when a plant is named after a person, you always capitalize that particular plant name because it it's kind of considered more of a proper noun when it's named after an individual. The more I learned about Joel Roberts Poinsettia, the less I wanted to capitalize the word poinsettia. But we'll we'll dive into that because when when he discovered it, I'm using air quotes for people who are listening, it was already being frequently used by, you know, folks in Mexico, Central America. A lot of the the Spanish monks would decorate the the their churches with this plant during Christmas time because the flowering did coincide with Christmas holiday. So it was used, you know, readily, and it was a beautiful woody plant that that bloomed in December.
Chris Enroth:And then he discovered it, and and took some cuttings and sent it off to some botanists in The United States. And then I I believe it was the Philadelphia Flower Show. I think it was the Philadelphia Flower Show if it's been running for that long because it still goes on today.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. Some some flower show in Philadelphia.
Chris Enroth:Something. It I don't know if it's the same concurrently running flower show, but it was something in Philadelphia. In about 1829, it made its debut in The United States.
Ken Johnson:Yes. And I believe shortly after that, he was asked to leave Mexico because he was causing lots of problems.
Chris Enroth:And so what what was it? He what I have down in my notes here is basically he believed in American expansion at any cost. And, like and so he was just spreading this or building up, I maybe this descent in Mexico or the Mexican government trying to prop up the US government.
Ken Johnson:I think it was, yeah, Freemasonry and
Chris Enroth:Mhmm.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. Get the I guess, yeah, increase that support of America in Mexico.
Chris Enroth:Yes. Yeah. I mean, he was kind of you mentioned Freemason. I mean, that was that that kind of, like, is back when Freemasons were more like the Freemasons we saw in the movie National Treasure or something, you know, where they're they're doing all kinds of secretive acts in their secretive buildings. So the yeah.
Chris Enroth:I mean, he's really trying to prop up the US government. And what didn't the Mexican people have a name that that describes the the word that we used before we started recording? I don't think we can say the behavior of poinsett when it was, like, point points pointissimo or point Let
Ken Johnson:me pull that up now.
Chris Enroth:Poinsettissimo. I'm not gonna pronounce these things correctly. I'm so sorry. I study German.
Ken Johnson:Me too.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. That was a big mistake. So what I I found here is Poinsettissimo. Again, that might be a mispronunciation of the word, and there's a couple things that this translates to intrusive, officius conduct, arrogant, high handedness. You're a jerk.
Chris Enroth:This but it is this name point boy, I can't say it. Pointismo. Pointsettismo This is is named after the same guy that the Poinsettia is named after. So, obvious the Mexican people did not like this guy. They made a whole word that describes something brought bad, like negative human conduct.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. I think in later several years later, became secretary of war and was played a part in the displacement of the Cherokee people, Trail of Tears, and all that stuff. So not not the best history on him No. As as we look back.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. That he basically kicked off the Trail of Tears in, like you know, when it was all sanctioned by the US government to move, like, a 100,000 people from the East out to the West. So yeah, that's probably why I don't wanna be like, I'm not as like, I wanna capitalize this to honor Joel Poinsett, which I think is interesting information that, you know, we had a Poinsettia page with extension, and it didn't mention any of that stuff.
Ken Johnson:I've been reading something you came across of maybe a little bit more of a push to go back to the or not go back to, but go to the, the more, I guess, indigenous name, if you wanna call that, opposed to.
Chris Enroth:I mean, I'll get it eventually, so I'm I'm fine with whatever. But it it it is kind of hard, and some people might who who do maybe read up on this or know more than I do, will say, well, Joel Poinsett also was a founding member of the Smithsonian and, you know, I'm sure did other good things, but, you know, also a slave owner, also did a lot of other bad things. So, boy, history's harsh.
Ken Johnson:It's all shades of gray.
Chris Enroth:It really, really has become that for this beautiful holiday plant. Well, Ken, so talked about the history, how poinsettia got one of its names, its most popular name at least here in The United States. Let's talk about the plant itself now. I guess, what did it look like growing in its its native range and and habitat down in Mexico, and South America?
Ken Johnson:Yeah. So it's a it's a perennial. I mean, it's a woody plant, and it gets much bigger than what we are accustomed to. I mean, it's gonna get beat several feet tall. And the pictures I've seen, I've never seen it in the wild, but it's a little more it's kinda scraggly looking.
Ken Johnson:It's it's longer, elongated. It's not the nice compact plant that we're that we're used to. So there's been a lot of of breeding and other things that have gone into getting it to the point where kinda where we're at now. A lot of that started at, you know, like, in the forties when a lot of that breeding is and using it as a houseplant really kinda came into into play here in The United States anyway.
Chris Enroth:Mhmm. Right. Like, back in the thirties and forties, the the Brach's leaves I guess we we haven't even gotten to that flower morphology yet, what's a flower and what's not a flower on the plant. But the red part, which is actually not technically the flower, it is a more of a leaf, that would only last, I read, up to ten days. After that, they would fall off.
Chris Enroth:So it's very short lived, very, very short lived in terms of its kind of display colors. And it was that breeding that really occurred throughout the twentieth century that gave us that poinsettia that we know today where I can I have one on my dining room table? It has been red since we bought it, like, before Thanksgiving, and it looks the same. It's it's probably gonna hold on to those Brax till after Christmas. So, I mean, it's they've made a lot of improvements on just how long it holds on to those.
Ken Johnson:And I think when it because it those Braxton last very long. I think originally, it was used more as a cut flower.
Chris Enroth:Mhmm.
Ken Johnson:And then, you know, the breeding, we got into more compact and longer lasting, and then we could use it as a help a houseplant like we do now. Yeah.
Chris Enroth:Well and I I also have taken poinsettias, and I've overwintered them, and I've planted them in my landscape before. And they do turn into a a nice sized shrub. Obviously, they're not winter hardy here in Illinois, but throughout the summer, it's this beautiful green, pretty full looking shrub. It gets pretty big, puts on a lot of growth between when I can get it out in the spring and it dies back in the fall.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. Can't grow them outside year out yet.
Chris Enroth:Not yet. Working on it.
Ken Johnson:Hopefully, never will be able to, but
Chris Enroth:Well, when we're old and retired. We'll see.
Ken Johnson:Yes.
Chris Enroth:So circling back a little bit, we we didn't really dive much into to another kind of controversial issue that involves pretty much the market of the the poinsettia plant, and that is the fact that it is native, to Mexico, Central America, yet that part of the world makes almost nothing on the production or sale of that plant throughout the entire world. And, I mean, this is a as I mentioned before, this is a huge industry. You know, Ken mentioned number one selling house plant. So it's it's there's a lot of money to be made here, and this is kind of an interesting train of events. There's we'll we'll have to do a little bit of sleuthing, I guess, on this one.
Chris Enroth:So looking at an article in chronica horticulture, which is a a publication, they have an article in their Poinsettia history and transformation. They said that Mexican growers were convinced that Joel Poinsett had patented Poinsettias in The US, and this was to keep Mexican growers from selling them in The US, essentially an embargo on Mexican production of the poinsettia plant. And they're they even had they found newspaper articles and everything like this in from Mexico that that spelled this out. However, when they went and looked at, like, The US where the patent office, they've been doing patents since, 1795, 1795, they could not find any patent or document on Poinsettia. So somebody started a rumor down in Mexico that they couldn't do this.
Chris Enroth:Your you can raise suspicions upon whomever. Maybe it was Joel Poinsett. Maybe it was nursery grower that wanted to corner the market. Either way, I I would say at this point in time, the market has been cornered. I don't know how you would break into that at this point in time because the genetics are so stringently controlled on these plants.
Chris Enroth:So with all the breeding, as we had mentioned, that has occurred here, it it would be it would be tough to go back to square one with the wild poinsettia and start back over.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. I think more of the production is in Mexico and Central America now, but it's US or European Mhmm. Businesses doing it. It's not businesses from there. Like, I think, I mean, with with a lot of heating costs, the few the heating costs and stuff like that are associated with us trying to produce this in the winter, it's it's cheaper to do it down there and then import the plants into The US or or Europe.
Chris Enroth:And we even have I and and we were researching for this topic. We discovered we have a major poinsettia trial here in Illinois that we didn't even know about. It's a commercial grower in Illinois that does an open house every year. So, yeah, Ken and I were just surprised like, oh, that's that's a lot of poinsettias under glass. And speaking of poinsettias under glass, Ken, how do they grow these plants?
Chris Enroth:Because they have some pretty specific daylight requirements. Right? There's what what does it take to get a poinsettia to flower?
Ken Johnson:Yeah. So poinsettias are referred to as short day plants, but it's actually long night. So, basically, the the length of the night is going to influence when they start blooming. So once they get a certain a certain amount of darkness at night, they will they will induce flowering in these plants. Those they'll start producing those red bracts, start producing those yeah.
Ken Johnson:Those flowers, those little yellow dots in the middle of the bracts, those are actually the flowers.
Chris Enroth:Is that Or the term is involucre? Is that the botanical term?
Ken Johnson:For the flowers? I don't know. That's what yeah.
Chris Enroth:Syathia. That's what it is. Yeah. What's the Never heard. What's the involucre term?
Chris Enroth:I'm I'm making things up as I go. So yeah.
Ken Johnson:Ken here real quick. I'm gonna cut in. If you're curious as to what an involuca is, it is a whirl of bracts that are close or close and underneath a flower or inflorescence. So think of, like, a dandelion, all those little green leaf like things underneath the flower, those would be an involucre. Also, the cap of an acorn is also considered an involucre.
Ken Johnson:So if you're curious, now you know. And I will return to our discussion on point setups.
Chris Enroth:So sorry, Ken. I just broke your your your train of thought.
Ken Johnson:Sorry. Trying to think of how many hours it requires.
Chris Enroth:Is it twelve and twelve?
Ken Johnson:Eleven point seven five hours That's so specific. Darkness. So once you hit that point, that'll start the formation. But if you interrupt that at all, that'll break it. So and when they're growing these, they're they're putting on black cloth at night to prevent that.
Ken Johnson:Same thing if you were doing this at home. So you'd wanna put them in a dark room or in a closet under a box, something like that, so you don't have any light interrupting that darkness. Because otherwise, that'll that'll mess up that flower production. So that's that's one of those kind of little bit added difficulty in there because you do have to have that darkness. And but because of that, you can play with and force them to bloom when you want them to.
Ken Johnson:So Mhmm. You know, if you're growing them in an area where maybe they're gonna bloom earlier, and they would have started blooming earlier, they wouldn't you're gonna miss that Christmas market. You can interrupt that night period to to delay that until they they would normally be blooming or vice versa. If you're in an area where they would start blooming, you know, after that peak market, you can then force them to bloom earlier by creating that darkness that they wouldn't normally have if you don't do something about it. So they they can't be manipulated.
Ken Johnson:It's not like like Christmas cactus that you get this time of year. That's also day length. A lot of plants, the flowering is is driven by day length, and that can be manipulated to to meet that market that you want.
Chris Enroth:Mhmm. Yeah. A lot of people think it's temperature, but more often than not, plants are controlled by the length of day or or night, you know, is is the case. So and so that it's the light exposure, essentially. And when you have control of that, as the major poinsettia growers have, when they have control, they can do all kinds of, like, little minor adjustments and tinkering, and they so stringently try to, manage that light exposure.
Chris Enroth:I've been told that people are not even allowed to, like, walk into a a garden house or a a greenhouse where the shade where the the cloth is over it, they're trying to exclude light. Because simply just walking in, opening the door, that can disrupt that light for any plants that get exposed to the light coming into the doorway.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. I'm not sure how much intensity you can have, but Mhmm. I guess I'll like, you're not having a straight light by airplanes and getting that the darkness you need.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. Yeah. Well, Ken, I I guess there is a lot of difficulty, and there's a lot of work that goes into producing a poinsettia in Illinois because, well, one, you gotta control the light because we have this whole planet that's on this axis thing that doesn't like to give us twelve hour days, twelve hour nights. So so that's one aspect, but it's a tropical plant. And the one thing that I find that happens a lot is that when this plant goes from greenhouse to the store and then gets bought at the store by the consumer and taken home, a lot times it's cold outside.
Chris Enroth:After all, it's December in Illinois, and these plants get home, and and after about a day or two, they see these this browning at the tips or the margins where they got exposed to that cold. So how what's a good technique for transporting these plants from store to home?
Ken Johnson:So double bagging would be good. Ideally, you'd have paper or something. Either the store would have it or bring a newspaper with you. Wrap your plants, put it in the bag. Make sure you close the top of that bag off.
Ken Johnson:If you just leave that bag open, cold air can get in. I guess going back even a step further, if it's a really cold day, don't buy the plants. If you can avoid it, wait till it's a little bit warmer out. You know? Don't go out buying them when there's a polar vortex coming through or something like that.
Ken Johnson:So so plan that out if if at all possible. Again, easier said than done a lot of times, but try to go on a little bit warmer day or or during the day when it's warmer compared to at night. Bet double bag them, insulate them, make sure the top's closed, park close to the entrance or go with somebody so they can start the car. You don't wanna you know, if you're shopping for a while, your car gets cold, you bring them in. It's gonna take a little time to warm it up.
Ken Johnson:So if you have your vehicle warmed already, you just reduce the time it's gonna be. Exposed to those cool temperatures. Don't put them in the trunk of the car because it's not gonna be as warm as as the cabin. So
Chris Enroth:I'll forget about it.
Ken Johnson:Keep them warm with you. Don't put them up against the window because that window is gonna be cold, that's gonna I mean, temperatures in the forties and stuff can damage these. So it's it's gonna need to be you know, avoid those cold temperatures if at all possible. You know, avoid plants. A lot of times, you go into the the big box stores, big doors that are open and closing, lined with poinsettias, and all that cold air is getting sucked in every time somebody comes in.
Ken Johnson:So that's the only display they have. Do it further from the doors so those aren't gonna be as exposed to the cold. Alternatively, I've seen where they've got them set up, you know, kind of in their outdoor center that's not terribly well insulated, so they've got a big heater running. The ones right underneath the heater are always getting burned up because it's either too hot or it's drying them out so fast they keep they don't keep up with the watering. So Mhmm.
Ken Johnson:It take a little time and look through the plants. Don't just grab one and and hope for the best.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. Yeah. No. I I I feel like once I purchase my my poinsettia, I'm I'm committed to taking care of that plant as well. And as I mentioned, I I plant these things one if if they survive in my house over winter, I will plant them out in my garden.
Chris Enroth:I I will say if folks are interested in more information, maybe something to sit down and read, we can link to Ken's actually wrote an infosheet about this, about poinsettias and and care. So we'll put that link down down below in the thing ba bob. And but I would say the biggest thing, when you get that thing home, it usually has a decorative foil around the pot. And, usually, the pot's just maybe it's a clay plastic color. It's it's plastic, but it's colored like it's ceramic clay or something, or it's just a black pot plastic pot.
Chris Enroth:That decorative foil wrapper just keeps too much moisture, too much water inside that pot. We really need the the water to be able to drain out of the pot into a saucer or into the sink. It needs to be able to leave because poinsettias don't like having water up against the roots. They like they they need to have good drainage. And so if I can give you one tip, if you want this to survive a little bit longer and maybe even plant it in your landscape for the springtime, take that foil wrapper off.
Chris Enroth:Ken, got any more care tips to get it through the winter to spring?
Ken Johnson:Yeah. Or if you want the foil, take it out to water and let it drain thoroughly drain before you put it back in. It's not holding all that water, or you can poke holes in the foil and put
Chris Enroth:it in the sink. Plate under it.
Ken Johnson:Yep. Yeah. Or give the kids some markers, and they can draw on the pot.
Chris Enroth:Oh, that's a great idea. See, Ken is full of great ideas.
Ken Johnson:And themselves and the table and the walls. Else.
Chris Enroth:Drew with permanent marker on the dining room table.
Ken Johnson:Rubbing alcohol.
Chris Enroth:That happened.
Ken Johnson:As your friend No.
Chris Enroth:This does it? Oh, well, I'm gonna have to try it. It's been on there for a few months.
Ken Johnson:For nail polish remover. One of the two. Get rid of these now. Try those. Keep rubbing alcohol first.
Ken Johnson:Fire. That works. I'll be able to just make sure they're well watered. And, you know, once they start to lose those those bracts, then just kinda treat them like a houseplant from then on out. So not not terribly.
Ken Johnson:Most people toss them. They're Mhmm. 95%, if not more, just toss them, which is fine. That's what you wanna do. Compost them, and the growers appreciate you for buying new ones every year.
Chris Enroth:So this comes back to the idea of poinsettia, you know, when it's in my yard, grows in this big shrub, but it's flowering when it's, like, six inches tall. So how do they get that to happen? How does a a a commercial greenhouse force a short little poinsettia when they really wanna get tall? Do do you know how they do that, Ken?
Ken Johnson:So all all everything you're buying is gonna be done by a cutting, so they're not growing this from seed. So these are all cuttings that have been started. They found that, you know, if you've got so usually, they're fairly straight, not a whole lot of branching. They found I don't remember when, but that if you if you were to graft a a non branching or plant that grow branches very little, like cultivar onto a brand more branching type, they found there's actually a phytoplasma that causes a lot of that branching or the the plants become to branch more than they would normally would. So that once that was discovered, that kind of, you know, did a lot of stuff for for these becoming houseplants because you can get that more branching.
Ken Johnson:More branching means more bracts, more leaves, all of that.
Chris Enroth:More full. Yeah. People like full plants.
Ken Johnson:Not the tall, scraggly, Charlie Brown Christmas tree types. And then on top of that, you've got your plant growth regulators that can be applied to plants. That's gonna reduce the growth, make them more compact, pinching plants. So just like you would with mums or something like that, you can go off, pinch off those growing points, that'll cause them to branch, create more branching. So there's you've got the your phytoplasma that that's introduced to the plants.
Ken Johnson:It doesn't harm them at all. Just creates causes them to branch more. You get your plant growth regulators that'll cause branching and and reduce growth, more compact growth, and then pinching, which should do the same thing. So you've got all those things going on. Create that nice tight compact plant.
Ken Johnson:It's got a lot of leaves, a lot of bracts for you. And you could do that at home. If you're growing outside, go out and pinch them to create more branching and get a more compact plant.
Chris Enroth:So much has gone into the development of these poinsettias that everybody buys this time of year. Interesting. The the phytoplasma that that they discover that moved from poinsettias that had a kind of a tighter branching, they could graft them on there and and move that disease into that other one to promote more branching into other plants. That's very interesting.
Ken Johnson:I know. I know I see a disease in air quotes too. I mean, it is an alteration, but I think usually it's disease with something bad. But in this type of case, it's still probably a disease, but a desirable one.
Chris Enroth:Mhmm. It's nice for us. I don't know how the poinsettia feels about it, if it does at all. Interesting. So yeah.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. The phytoplasma, which is not we look we we looked this up because there was an article where they kept calling it a virus. We're like, wait a second. That's over here, it's phytoplasma. Over here, it's a virus.
Chris Enroth:These are two different things. So it it is not the virus. If you're reading one source, it is a phytoplasma that is causing that improved branching on poinsettia.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. They found out when they put that non branching on there, when they take cuttings of that non branching, they're more branched. So that's kinda how they figured out something was was going on there and eventually isolated it.
Chris Enroth:Yep. Because because genetics can't move. Like, they can't move genes from one to the other. So they knew that it had to be some type of a pathogen that was going from one plant into the grafted between the graft into the new, part. Yeah.
Chris Enroth:Fascinating. Science. So sciency, which, of course, brings us around to maybe the most famous legend of poinsettia as deadly poisonous. Right, Ken? I mean, looking at it, it's dangerous.
Chris Enroth:And was did this start I think there was a story about child that had eaten poinsettia that either got sick or or possibly died from this. But, actually, I don't think that really became what the the actual story was. So how poisonous is this plant? Can I put it on my salad?
Ken Johnson:Well, you could, but probably not gonna Can I survive it? Yes. I think it was it was around somewhere around 1919 was where this Poinsettia or Poinsettia is is deadly. Or two year old kid ate some and then died afterwards. But they've studies have been done, and it's it's not toxic.
Ken Johnson:I shouldn't say not toxic, but it's not deadly poisonous. You'd have to eat pounds of it in order for it to to cause harm. So there there was an experiment with rats where they fed them poinsettias, and they tried to see what the dose would be. After eating an equivalent of 500 leaves or 2.2 pounds of sap, they did not find. They didn't kill the rats.
Ken Johnson:They they That's a lot of poinsettia. Equivalent to a human. So I suppose if you really wanted to, you could have a poinsettia salad. I can't imagine it tastes very good. I would have
Chris Enroth:never done it. Taste good. It has a white sap, so I I imagine it really doesn't taste good.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. So the sap the sap can cause dermatitis in some people, so that may be a little bit where it comes from. So some people may be sensitive to that sap, but not deadly poisonous. Mhmm.
Chris Enroth:Well, you think about what they were spraying on those plants back in the nineteen twenties. I mean, arsenic and lead, high doses of cadmium. I mean, just everything.
Ken Johnson:Not not good.
Chris Enroth:Yeah. So So it's dangerous to eat anything.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. Still still wanna avoid it, keep it away from kids and and animals. Yeah. Because it probably would probably could cause him upset stomach, but should not have to worry about AMI dying after eating it. But if you're concerned, talk to a doctor.
Ken Johnson:Go to the ER. If you're concerned, better be safe than sorry.
Chris Enroth:Yep. Go to the ER. Talk to a doctor. Call poison control. Do all of those things because we are not human doctors.
Chris Enroth:I'm not even a a doctor doctor. So
Ken Johnson:oh,
Chris Enroth:goodness. So I I already have a poinsettia, but I would like to go shopping for more poinsettias. I am very familiar with the bright red colored poinsettia. But when I was looking at some of these different, cultivars that are at these various trials throughout well, the one in Illinois and they have others throughout the The US, I see colors I don't associate with poinsettia because there's white, red and white, and there's shades of almost every color imaginable between those two. I I even saw an orange shaded or colored poinsettia.
Chris Enroth:Do I need to go get my eyes checked, my prescription off, Ken? Why are there orange colored poinsettias?
Ken Johnson:They're the magic of breeding. So we've got reds. You get your bright red. There's darker reds. I'm seeing more maroons I've seen pictures of.
Ken Johnson:I've never seen them in person. The whites think red and white is what you're typically gonna find in the store Mhmm. At least where I'm at in Illinois. Maybe if you're in a bigger Chicago or something, you'll be able to find some of these weird colors. We have orange.
Ken Johnson:I've seen yellows, stuff that's getting into purple. Almost there's once I have speckled this, so red with white speckles or stripes and all kinds of other stuff. You do occasionally see blue ones, so those are not actually the plan. Those have been painted in some way. Maybe a red, yellow, white, orange, purplish, pinks, lots of pinks and stuff too.
Ken Johnson:So it's not yeah. It's just not your your grandparents, like I It's all kinds of different colors.
Chris Enroth:They're they're they're even messing with the the leaves and the bracts too. You have ruffled or where the the fringe or the margin of the leaf is is wavy and just just all these creative things. And as Ken said, I'm probably not gonna find that in my area of Illinois, but maybe some other listeners, if you're in have maybe a more specialty type grower in your neck of the woods, you might find some of these really neat, interesting, and unique poinsettias. So, yeah, buy them up. Let them know that you like them and you wanna you want them to make more of them.
Ken Johnson:For the Internet. Mhmm. Can find anything.
Chris Enroth:It does exist. Yeah. The I don't I don't know. Internet, plants, yeah, scares me sometimes.
Ken Johnson:Shipping may get complicated too,
Chris Enroth:but It definitely will. I'll have to I'll have to have it shipped here in the summer and then do everything that growers do. Mm-mm. Not gonna happen. I can barely keep a normal plant alive.
Chris Enroth:I got mother in law's tongue. Now if I do kill my mother in law's tongue, I'm in trouble. So
Ken Johnson:Buy a whole bunch of them, spend a lot of money, then you feel obligated to take care of
Chris Enroth:it. There you go. That's what I did with my ginger. So well, that was a lot of great information about poinsettias. You probably didn't know you needed to know.
Chris Enroth:I guess you didn't need
Ken Johnson:to know it,
Chris Enroth:but now you do. And then if you wanna forget about it, go ahead and re listen to us again. It's that easy. So the Good Growing podcast is a production of University of Illinois Extension, edited this week by Ken. Are you editing this week?
Chris Enroth:Oh, yeah. He gave me the nod. Alright. Well, thank you, Ken. And thank you for being here with me today to talk about the good old poinsettia, or how do we pronounce the the original name?
Ken Johnson:Put my pronunciation here. Quetleshoshae.
Chris Enroth:Quetleshoshae. Working on it. I'll get it.
Ken Johnson:Yes. You. And this isn't necessarily useless. Remember, we got all kinds of trivia, holiday trivia coming up. It's May cover maybe.
Ken Johnson:Remember who you learned it from. Oh, yes.
Chris Enroth:That's right. Name your trivia team after us. Yes. That's right.
Ken Johnson:Yeah. Tell tell everybody to subscribe.
Chris Enroth:Subscribe. We get no extra money for any loyalty or any more people you bring. We're a university, so but we do want people to know
Ken Johnson:about us. Just the ego boost.
Chris Enroth:That's right. We like it. Makes us feel good.
Ken Johnson:And let's do this again next week.
Chris Enroth:Oh, we shall do this again next week. We might continue this conversation about holiday plants and do another deep dive. And I know we're gonna be talking about holiday spices coming up, so that's gonna be another fun episode as well. So listeners, thank you for doing what you do best and that is listening or if you're watching this on YouTube, watching. And as always, keep on growing.
Chris Enroth:We can circle back. Right? We can do that. Sure. Serpentine.
Chris Enroth:Yes. It's a serpentine train of thought here.
Ken Johnson:Stream of conscious, bud. Yeah.
Chris Enroth:Oh, my stream of conscious. Not good. Not good.
Ken Johnson:Don't
Chris Enroth:wanna go in there.
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