Lakeshore Garden Centres Plant Finder

Other Names:  Orange Trumpet Flower, Cahauto

Brand:  Proven Winners

Description:

A heat loving, compact variety with a tropical appearance, featuring clusters of showy orange flowers from dark red buds all season long; a perfect thriller for containers or as a planting for smaller spaces

Ornamental Features

Chicklet® Orange Esperanza features showy clusters of orange trumpet-shaped flowers with red overtones and yellow throats along the branches from early summer to early fall, which emerge from distinctive crimson flower buds. Its serrated pointy leaves emerge light green in spring, turning dark green in colour the rest of the year.

Landscape Attributes

Chicklet® Orange Esperanza is a multi-stemmed annual with an upright spreading habit of growth. Its medium texture blends into the garden, but can always be balanced by a couple of finer or coarser plants for an effective composition.

This plant will require occasional maintenance and upkeep, and is best pruned in late winter once the threat of extreme cold has passed. It is a good choice for attracting bees, butterflies and hummingbirds to your yard, but is not particularly attractive to deer who tend to leave it alone in favor of tastier treats. It has no significant negative characteristics.

Chicklet® Orange Esperanza is recommended for the following landscape applications;

• Accent
• Mass Planting
• General Garden Use
• Container Planting

Planting & Growing

Chicklet® Orange Esperanza will grow to be about 6 feet tall at maturity, with a spread of 4 feet. When grown in masses or used as a bedding plant, individual plants should be spaced approximately 24 inches apart. It has a low canopy with a typical clearance of 1 foot from the ground. Although it's not a true annual, this plant can be expected to behave as an annual in our climate if left outdoors over the winter, usually needing replacement the following year. As such, gardeners should take into consideration that it will perform differently than it would in its native habitat.

This plant does best in full sun to partial shade. It prefers to grow in average to moist conditions, and shouldn't be allowed to dry out. It is not particular as to soil type, but has a definite preference for acidic soils, and is subject to chlorosis (yellowing) of the foliage in alkaline soils. It is somewhat tolerant of urban pollution. This particular variety is an interspecific hybrid.

Chicklet® Orange Esperanza is a fine choice for the garden, but it is also a good selection for planting in outdoor pots and containers. With its upright habit of growth, it is best suited for use as a 'thriller' in the 'spiller-thriller-filler' container combination; plant it near the center of the pot, surrounded by smaller plants and those that spill over the edges. It is even sizeable enough that it can be grown alone in a suitable container. Note that when growing plants in outdoor containers and baskets, they may require more frequent waterings than they would in the yard or garden.