CyberSalad: Garden Pursuits: Bulbs: Tuberous Begonia

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Begonia tuberhybrida

     This free-blooming begonia, beloved by so many gardeners, produces 2- to 10-inch flowers in all colors except blue and green. Several types of this species are widely available: upright plants 12 to 18 inches tall; hanging basket begonias, often called Pendula, with trailing stems 12 to 18 inches long; and Multiflora varieties, bushy 8- to 10-inch plants bearing great numbes of 2-inch flowers.
     Tuberous begonias do best in light to medium shade, and can be grown in gardens throughout Zones 2-10 but must be dug up each fall and replanted in the spring. Plant directly in the garden or start indoors and transplant outside. In the garden, plants do best in light shade in a 6-inch-deep soil mixture of 2 parts loam, 2 parts peat moss, and 1 part well-rotted or dried cow manure. Plant the tubers 12-15 inches apart. Feed with a weak, all-purpose fertilizer such as 5-10-5 every two or three weeks from the time the first shoot appears until the foliage starts to wither. When the plants have died back to the ground, dig up the tubers, allowing some soil to cling to them; place the tubers in a sheltered frost-free spot for a few weeks, until they are so dry that the stems and the soil around them break away easily. Store the tubers over the winter in bags of dry vermiculite, perlite, or peat moss, at 40 to 50 degrees.
     To increase the length of the growing season, start tubers indoors about two months before the expected arrival of 50 degree nights; press them, hollow side up, into wooden flats or plastic trays filled with damp peat moss but do no cover them. When growth starts, pot in 5- or 6-inch pots using the above described mixture. When night temperatures rise above 50 degrees set the plants outdoors. Propagate in early spring by taking cuttings from the shoots that arise from the tubers. Plants started from seed indoors in January will flower in June.

'Grandiflora Pink' a coral pink double tuberous begonia.

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Site launched January 1, 2000.
Site updated September 1, 2007.