Other Names:  Red-hot Poker, Flame Flower, Tritoma

Description:

An excellent, unusual variety featuring toffee colored flower buds that open white for a bi-color effect; creates a spectacular border or container display; makes a great cut flower and attracts hummingbirds

Ornamental Features

Toffee Nosed Torchlily features bold spikes of coppery-bronze tubular flowers with brick red overtones at the ends of the stems from early to late summer, which emerge from distinctive brown flower buds. The flowers are excellent for cutting. Its grassy leaves remain dark green in color throughout the year.

Landscape Attributes

Toffee Nosed Torchlily is an open herbaceous evergreen perennial with tall flower stalks held atop a low mound of foliage. Its relatively fine texture sets it apart from other garden plants with less refined foliage.

This is a relatively low maintenance plant, and should be cut back in late fall in preparation for winter. It is a good choice for attracting 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.

Toffee Nosed Torchlily is recommended for the following landscape applications;

• Mass Planting
• General Garden Use
• Container Planting

Planting & Growing

Toffee Nosed Torchlily will grow to be about 24 inches tall at maturity extending to 3 feet tall with the flowers, with a spread of 30 inches. When grown in masses or used as a bedding plant, individual plants should be spaced approximately 24 inches apart. It grows at a medium rate, and under ideal conditions can be expected to live for approximately 10 years. As an evegreen perennial, this plant will typically keep its form and foliage year-round.

This plant does best in full sun to partial shade. It prefers dry to average moisture levels with very well-drained soil, and will often die in standing water. It is considered to be drought-tolerant, and thus makes an ideal choice for a low-water garden or xeriscape application. It is not particular as to soil pH, but grows best in sandy soils. It is somewhat tolerant of urban pollution. This particular variety is an interspecific hybrid. It can be propagated by division; however, as a cultivated variety, be aware that it may be subject to certain restrictions or prohibitions on propagation.

Toffee Nosed Torchlily 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.