Growing "Jacob's Ladder" Plant

The Beet: A Podcast For Plant Lovers

Epic Gardening

Home & Garden, Education, Leisure, How To

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 16 September 2018

⏱️ 6 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Once upon a time, the Jacob’s ladder plant was called the “charity plant”, although it shouldn’t be confused with the Mahonia species that also bears that common name. It’s also been called “Greek valerian”, although it’s not a valerian. Confused yet? You shouldn’t be. Jacob’s ladder gets its common name from the ladder-like or pinnate structure of its leafy foliage. And in the spring and early summer months, it shoots up slender stalks from which hang clusters of bell-like flowers. A shade-loving variety, it has origins overseas, but is often found in the United States in garden cultivation now. It’s such an easy-growing plant that it can even be considered slightly invasive if it’s in the right environment! However, it can be maintained and kept to its beds as well. Let’s delve deep into the world of the Polemonium species, and I’ll tell you all about this beautiful perennial! Learn More: Jacob’s Ladder Plant: Growing Polemonium Caeruleum At Home Keep Growing, Kevin Epic Soil Starter I've partnered with Garden Maker Naturals to formulate a custom organic fertilizer designed to take standard raised bed soil to the next level. I use it in all of my beds and containers. Order your Epic Soil Starter now. Follow Epic Gardening Everywhere: YouTube Instagram Pinterest Facebook Facebook Group Twitter Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	What's up everyone and welcome back to the epic gardening podcast today we're talking about a plant that has a name of one of those like children's toys I think it was called the Jacob's ladder plant also known as the charity plant and it should not be
0:15.1	confused with the Mahonia species that also bears that common name. So it's a
0:19.8	shade-loving plant. It is an ornamental so I'm actually talking about
0:23.0	ornamentals for once in a blue moon on the podcast. So let's go ahead and get into
0:27.2	it. What is the Jacob's Ladder plant and why might you want to grow it? Well
0:30.4	where did it come from? It came from the temperate regions of Europe and Asia. Beautiful
0:35.8	addition to the garden and it's native to meadowland, woods and grasslands, which means, you know, if we know where something was native, then we can kind of know how to care for it in our homes, right?
0:47.0	So if something is native to a meadowland or a grassland, it might be a lower-lying plant,
0:52.0	maybe that means that it needs some shade.
0:54.0	And that is true for this plant.
0:55.4	It definitely loves a little bit of shade,
0:57.5	and it only grows to about 18 to 24 inches in height.
1:01.9	So let's talk about how to actually care for it.
1:04.2	Really good for beginner gardeners
1:05.4	just because it's so easy to grow,
1:07.7	but it produces a flower.
1:08.8	So you get some nice beautiful flowers.
1:11.2	You get this sort of blue violetviolet exterior and then like a yellow interior, but it's easy to care for,
1:16.2	unlike some of these flowers that are quite difficult to care for, and at least from my view,
1:20.5	they're only ornamental, although I know it's probably blast me
1:23.6	saying that a lot of people grow ornamental things I just typically grow more
1:27.4	edibles just the thing that's more interesting to me but I'm trying I'm
	...

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