What Are Exotic Plants
Exotic plants are not your standard kind of plant. These could be flowers, fruits or vegetables that you usually do not purchase at grocery. In fact, you may need to go a specialty market for these kinds of plants. You may already be familiar with them, for example you have a standard Gros Michel banana or the most common found in grocery stores, the cavendish. However, there are different varieties of bananas, like the “Truly Tiny” which is a 3-foot banana tree that produces tiny edible bananas, the Musa Basjoo which is cold hearty (we’ll learn more about this later) banana plant that can grow up to 20 feet or more. Or you have everyone’s favorite (or one you are just learning about) the blue java banana which is variety that grows blue bananas before they ripen to yellow. Outside of bananas you have lychees, rambutans, kiwano, guanabana (soursop), papaya, passion fruit, star fruit, bird of paradise, hibiscus and so many more. Most listed are fruiting plants but most bear unbelievable colored flowers. I recommending searching up exotic plants in Google and going crazy. In fact, you may discover a nursery near you that sells these plants. Just make sure you know your hardiness zone (we’ll learn more about that later) so you now how you can grow it in your area.
Kamila Maciejewska
Hardiness Zones
The USDA has 26 different hardiness zones (1-13a and 1-13b) all across the US and Puerto Rico. However, most of the time on the plants tag it will just list a number between 1-13, so you do not need to worry about a or b. Essentially a hardiness zone is what your minimum temperament is in the area that you live in. For example, up north like North Dakota ranges from 2-4 on the hardiness scale. Meaning the lowest temperature, it will get is between -45 and -25 F (-45.6 and -28.9 C). Then you have areas like Hawaii that between 25-70+ F (-3.9-21.1 C) depending on which island you live on. The USDA Hardiness Zone does not take into account humidity levels and how much light per day each state gets.
Gabriel Jimenez
Gardening Basics
Taking care of exotic plants is almost similar to every other plants. Some will require lots of water, sunlight and fertilizer and others will need practically none. The very first thing you should always research is your Hardiness Zone and your soil type. This can be done through a simple google search on your zip code hardiness zone and “what plants grow well in my city”? After that, you can start gathering the materials that you will need. The top three is space, light and water. If you do not have access to that you may need to look into ways on obtaining these. If it’s light, you should be able to buy grow lights on Amazon or your nearest nursery. If it’s water, you could stock up on 5-gallon bottles or fill large water drums. Unless you are lucky enough to live in an area where water is abundant through weather, I’m looking at you Florida and Hawaii. Space is usually the hardest to get, but luckily you can grow pretty much anything inside in a raised pot or any kind of pot for this matter. Before purchasing any kind of exotic plant, put as much research as you can on the subject. The internet and books are pretty scattered on this information so I recommend using this site, local nursery and Reddit. In person is usually best because they will give you the best advice. After, you have done your research you can purchase your plant. Depending on what you researched you will learn how important watering is. I don’t mean to scare you but water is both the nectar of plant life and reaper of all exotic plants. In fact, watering will be the hardest part as you will need to determine what is best for your plant. Overwatering can rot your root system and underwatering that shrivel your root system. The general rule of thumb for exotic plants is making sure that the top soil is a little dark and moist to touch. Next thing you will learn about is the kind of soil you’ll need. From what I’ve learned most exotic plants like fast draining soil so your best friend will be cactus or palm soil. But again, go based on your research. As for the space, always go based on how tall your plant could get. 1-2 feet might do fine in a 12-inch pot, 3-4 feet might be best in 24-inch pot and anything above 5 feet would do best inground or in a large pot (24+ inches). You will also learn that some exotic plants love all sun, partial sun (also known as shaded) or completely shaded from the sun. You can learn more about specific plants on this website, feel free to browse.
Cassidy Phillips