2006 ASCFG Fresh Cut Flower of the Year
This plant is going places. Once relegated to a few perennial borders, coneflowers are now gracing catalog and magazine covers. Recent breeding work has produced a broad range of colors and interesting - occasionally bizarre - petal arrangements. To be honest, however, the original coneflower was pretty darn nice and 'Ruby Star' is one of the best examples of its fine qualities. It has large flowers with long horizontal purple petals and rich ruby centers for which the cultivar is named. This durable plant is long lived and grows 2 to 4 feet tall with one to several flowers on each stem. The species is typically sold as a fresh cut flower. It can also be sold either fresh or dried without the ray petals, which are removed by hand, highlighting the coarse ruby red colored center florets.
Plants flower second year after planting. Coneflowers generally flower from late spring to mid summer. The plants tolerate heat, drought, and cold extremely well and are hardy from Zones 4 to 9. Established plants are drought tolerant but the best growth is obtained with regular irrigation prior to water stress. Although field grown plants for cut flowers have relatively low nutritional requirements, plants may benefit from application of 25 to 30 lb actual nitrogen per acre from either organic or inorganic sources. Generally 12 x 12 to 18 x 18 in. spacing is used in the field.
Coneflowers are usually pest free but caterpillars, grasshoppers, and Japanese beetles can be problems. The most common disease is root rot but aster yellows phytoplasma can be devastating - the symptoms range from yellowing leaves and flowers to severe stunting and deformed, yellow green flowers. Rogue infected plants as soon as possible, remove weeds, which are a source of the disease, and control the insect vector, leafhoppers, if possible.
Flowers are harvested when the petals have expanded and the first ring of disk florets has opened. Vase life is generally 7 to 12 days. Cut stems can be stored for 1 week at 36 to 45°F and can be shipped in water for up to 5 days. Cut coneflowers are not sensitive to external ethylene concentrations of up to 1 ppm. Although results can be variable, treatment with silver thiosulfate (STS) and preservatives may extend vase life.
Contact ASCFG at 440-774-2887 or www.ascfg.org for more information.