A Wagon Load of Moses
Posted: December 29, 2020 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Automatic Gardening, Moses-in -the- Bullrushes, Southern Gardening, Subtropical Gardening, Tradescantia spathacea 27 Comments
My Moses-in-the-Bulrushes (Tradscantia spathacea), spent many years growing in pots as a houseplant. The plant and its offspring have been with me since the 70’s. It has never been so happy as it has been since moving to the South.
Moses drops its seeds that readily germinate and the plant will spread. I have never been one to throw out a living plant and as they grew too big for beds, I’ve had to pull them up and replant them anyplace I could find space. The Moses I just pulled from a small corner bed filled the entire wagon. My one little pot has probably multiplied to nearly one hundred.
*I wrote this a few weeks ago and the grass is not as green right now.
They are so big. mine are so small.
That is one plant that will easily get out of hand if it gets the opportunity!
And it really is. I lived up North and my grandparents gave me one of theirs when I left for college. It always makes me think of them.
Really pretty plants–I like them in the wagon!
My kids rarely used the wagon, but I find it very useful.
Oh, I love this. These just popped up in my garden a few years ago and are considered invasive. The funny thing is they run off the terribly invasive Asian Sword Ferns…so I left them to do their work. I do not recall them as a house plant – and just throw some away sometimes, maybe I am a bad steward, though I am getting rid of the ferns.???
The original Moses was one given to me by my grandparents, so I have a soft spot for it. I planted some in my beds several years ago and they just kind of sat there (like the two Asian Ferns that turned into thousands), but this past year they grew to enormous size and reproduced like crazy. In college I gave lots away to the ladies that cleaned our rooms. As houseplants, they are very tame.
Hmm, its funny, I did not know these as houseplants. I love the flowers. Happy New Year.
In the cold and snowy north, many plants become houseplants. It is all we could do to get through the winter.
Me? I’m thinking of a nursery rhyme variation:
“Ring around the roses,
wagon full of Moses…”
It’s really a pretty plant. I don’t think I’ve seen it before.
That works.
Pretty amazing. Passalong plants are special.
They really are.
Pretty plant … love the purple in them.
Your Moses in the Bullrushes look so large and healthy. When I’ve had them as house plants from time they never did particularly well.
They love it here and I have never seen them this big either. I think the secret to having it as a houseplant, is to put it outside in the summer in semi-shade and sunny window inside in the winter.
Increase the scale of the second picture and it could be showing an “art car” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_car).
I have yet to make it to the Art Car parade in Houston. But you gave me a good idea for an entry.
We went to the art car parade there maybe 15 years ago, and we did it as a day trip from Austin.
What glorious colours. I must have seen this somewhere as a potted plant.
Yes, it is a great potted plant. Mine are from a parent plant that my grandparents grew, so the Moses has been in the family for more than 50 years.
Wow.
And I just realized the Latin name has Tradescantia/Tradscantia in it. That John Tradescant sure did get around.
I just learned something new. I did not know about John Tradescant. The plant’s name has recently been changed from Rhoeo spathacea, which I have used in former posts. The plant makes little pods with tiny white flowers that symbolize Moses in the Bulrushes.
He was the great English plant hunter who came to North America to find exciting new plants and brought them back home. There are many books written about him. (He could also have been the one who made popular the “cabinet of curiousities” – people would pay to come and see the items he had brought back from “the colonies”.
I definitely need to read up more on him. My favorite plant hunter is the American John Bartram who sent plants to England. I guess England received a nice collection of plants from the Americas.
Yes. They got many, many from Canada and the US.