The Celway Red celosia looks quite at home with bananas in this tropical style garden.

It’s not often that a raved-about cut flower crosses over into the landscape world with ease but such is the case with the Celway series of celosias. The Celway series known botanically as Celosia spicata comes in seven colors. Look for salmon, terracotta, purple, red, orange lemon and white.

If you get a little confused on your celosia groups, this is the one commonly called wheat straw or flamingo feather. Note, however, this one does do a little unique branching. You will treasure not only their vibrant color but also their tough-as-nails performance in the landscape.

Should you be on rotation to bring flowers to your local church or garden club you’ll also like knowing these little workhorses will give you around 10 days of vase-life.

Celosias need to be used in the landscape with much more regularity. Feathery plumes, cockscombs or wheat-like flowers like these are all types of flowers produced by celosias. The flowers are produced from summer through fall withstanding drought and extreme summer temperatures.

The Celway celosia will be a valuable source of color in the summer landscape when a lot of flowers are looking tired. In addition to being a great cut flower you might look at them as an everlasting because they are also well suited to drying and using in these types of arrangements.

Celway reaches just over 36 inches in the garden producing flowers that consist of one central spiky plume surrounded by several smaller spikes. Before planting, know that wet soggy soils are lethal to celosia so amend if soil drainage is suspect. Select healthy growing transplants with few buds showing or direct seed into warm soil. You’ll also get a lot more blooms if you choose a sunny location.

Before planting incorporate 2 pounds of a slow release fertilizer like a 12-6-6 with minor nutrients per 100 square feet of bed area. Space the plants 10 to 15 inches apart. Another popular trend of late is to scatter or broadcast the seeds with other flowers to create a wildflower meadow-like look.

If you are seriously into cut flowers, consider sowing multiple crops. The seeds will germinate in about a week and you’ll be in full harvest a couple of months later. To dry for winter arrangements harvest before seed-set, strip the foliage and hang upside down in a cool, dark, well-ventilated place.

Celosia is not a flower to be spot-planted but massed for the most effective landscape display. Plant them in combination with other drought tolerant flowers. The colorful plume like flowers are showiest in front of a backdrop of green shrubbery. The wheat formed selections give a light airy native prairie look to the landscape and combine well with gomphrena and ornamental grasses. They can also be used effectively in a tropical style garden.

The Celway celosia and the other varieties you may find may have their origination in Africa but you’ll find them quite at home in your garden giving you a long season of color. I hope you will give them a try.