Botanical Name: Kniphofia species
Common Name: Red Hot Poker

 

Use: Outdoors
Indigenous/Exotic : Indigenous
Evergreen/Deciduous : Deciduous or Evergreen
Plant Type : Perennial
Flower Colour : Red, orange, yellow, white
and shades thereof
Foliage Colour : Green
Best Season : Summer or Winter
Light : Sun to semi-shade
Hardiness : Semi-hardy to hardy
Attributes : Cut Flower, Attracts Bees
Height (m) : 0.50 - 1.8
Spread (m) :
    
Notes : Genus of about 70 species. Plants may be deciduous or evergreen, Winter or Summer flowering. Very striking and showy. Some are suitable as waterside plants, others grown in a mixed border. Clump-forming with arching, tufted, strap-shaped, grass-like leaves. Erect, dense spike-like flowers are borne on tall, stout stalks well above the foliage. Some spikes are bi-coloured, while some change colour through a range of shades, from top to bottom.

 

Attractive to bees. Numerous cultivars are available - from dwarf 50 centimetres high to tall 1.8 metres high. Grow in fertile, humus-rich, moist but well-drained, preferably sandy soil. Water well in the months prior to blooming. Mulch young plants with straw or leaves for the first Winter. Best propagated by division of the rhizomes. Divide established clumps in late Spring, only when absolutely necessary. Pests and diseases: thrips may cause mottling of the foliage.