''Tropaeolum tricolor'', the three-coloured Indian cress or Chilean nasturtium, is a species of perennial
plant
Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclud ...
in the family
Tropaeolaceae
''Tropaeolum'' , commonly known as nasturtium (; literally "nose-twister" or "nose-tweaker"), is a genus of roughly 80 species of annual and perennial herbaceous flowering plants. It was named by Carl Linnaeus in his book ''Species Plantarum'' ...
. It is
endemic
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...
to
Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...
,
[''Tropaeolum tricolor'' (three-coloured Indian cress).]
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew where it is called ''soldadito rojo'' and ''relicario''.
Description
''Tropaeolum tricolor'' is a summer-dormant climber which flowers from winter to spring.
[ It has thin, straggly stems growing from a reddish coloured root tuber and extending up to . The leaves are peltate (with the stalk in the centre), nearly circular with five or six deeply cut lobes. The numerous flowers are borne singly on long wiry stalks growing from the axils of the leaves. They are narrowly funnel-shaped and about long. The five sepals are red, orange or yellow tipped with a purple band, and extending backwards in a red spur. The small, greenish-yellow rounded petals have a clawed base. The sepals turn brown after the flowers fall and enclose the two or three, dark brown seeds.][
]
Distribution and habitat
Three-coloured Indian cress grows in the cloud forest
A cloud forest, also called a water forest, primas forest, or tropical montane cloud forest (TMCF), is a generally tropical or subtropical, evergreen, montane, moist forest characterized by a persistent, frequent or seasonal low-level cloud c ...
on the coastal mountains of northern Chile at . Further south it grows in inland temperate forests in the central and Los Lagos regions at varying heights.[ Here it grows on level ground or north facing slopes in full sun or dappled shade. It can endure periods of drought of up to 10 months in the summer.][
]
Cultivation
At the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, England, three-coloured Indian cress is grown in a frost-free Alpine house. Large pots with good drainage are filled with a loam-based compost and tubers are replanted each September. The plant soon starts into growth and flowers begin forming in the spring and the plant remains in flower for several months. Propagation is by seed or from the tubers which are often formed at the very bottom of a pot or force their way out through the drainage holes.[ The ]USDA Hardiness Zone
A hardiness zone is a geographic area defined as having a certain average annual minimum temperature, a factor relevant to the survival of many plants. In some systems other statistics are included in the calculations. The original and most wide ...
is 8.[ In cultivation in the UK, it does not tolerate being frozen, so in all but the mildest locations it must be grown under glass. It has gained the ]Royal Horticultural Society
The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), founded in 1804 as the Horticultural Society of London, is the UK's leading gardening charity.
The RHS promotes horticulture through its five gardens at Wisley (Surrey), Hyde Hall (Essex), Harlow Carr (Nort ...
’s Award of Garden Merit
The Award of Garden Merit (AGM) is a long-established annual award for plants by the British Royal Horticultural Society (RHS). It is based on assessment of the plants' performance under UK growing conditions.
History
The Award of Garden Merit ...
.
References
External links
{{Taxonbar, from=Q7845602
tricolor
Endemic flora of Chile