Exploring the ultimate Christmas plant, the poinsettia, and its Southern California history

Imagine driving down Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, looking off to the hills, and being overwhelmed by the sight of a vast field of poinsettias as far as the eye can see. Such was the vista that met the gaze of those making that drive around 1910. And it was all thanks to the efforts of Albert Ecke, father of the poinsettia industry, and his son Paul. The legacy of their poinsettia passion was memorialized with the naming of Poinsettia Drive and Poinsettia Place, two West Hollywood streets. Nearby DeLongpre Avenue is named for a French artist who lived in the area at that time and is famous for his poinsettia paintings, one of which is shown in a postcard that pictures the Sunset Boulevard poinsettia field.

Born in 1860 in Germany, Albert Ecke began his professional life as a school teacher. He was a health-minded vegetarian and later on, using an inheritance from his wife Henrietta, opened a sanitarium or long-term health care facility, meant primarily for tuberculosis patients. The sanitarium was a success but Ecke and his wife longed to escape Europe for a milder, more salubrious climate. They decided to set sail for Samoa where they would open another sanitarium. However, just before embarkation, they learned about the hospitable climate of Southern California from a friend who had visited there. The Eckes changed plans, and with their four children set sail from Genoa, Italy, for America, arriving at Ellis Island from where they made their way to Southern California, settling in Hollywood in 1902.

In Hollywood, they leased ten acres for $150 a year and developed a dairy farm on the property. They also grew melons and tomatoes, as well as chrysanthemums for cut flower bouquets and poinsettias, whose stems with the colorful bracts were cut and sold on street corners this time of year. But they could not make much profit with their dairy products or anything they grew except poinsettias. After the death of his father, Paul Ecke took over the family business. He decided to devote his energy exclusively to growing poinsettias and began looking for property closer to San Diego, where real estate was much less expensive and the climate was more conducive to poinsettia growth.

In 1923, Paul Ecke purchased forty acres in Encinitas, for $150 an acre, that would become Ecke Ranch and the hub of the poinsettia industry. Initially, he continued to harvest stems from field-grown plants and would ship them by train to St. Louis, Chicago, and New York. Soon, however, he began to grow potted poinsettia plants exclusively. In the 1990s, Paul Ecke’s son would expand the company’s operation to Guatemala where the lion’s share of its poinsettias, close to 20 million plants annually, are now grown.

Although Albert Ecke, who died in 1919, did not live to see poinsettias shipped as compact live plants, it was his innovation that made this possible. Poinsettias in their natural habitat are gangly plants that grow to a height of 15 feet, similar to the height seen in a row of them on display in Camarillo. If you exit the 101 Freeway at Camarillo Springs Road, you will discover a tall, breathtaking hedge of poinsettias that stretches for a thousand feet along the side of the road. This might be the St. Louis Red poinsettia variety, currently available through retail nurseries supplied by San Marcos Growers (smgrowers.com).

Albert Ecke was dissatisfied with the poinsettia’s elongated growth and decided to experiment with modifying it. He had learned how to dwarf the growth habit of plants from a neighboring gardener back in Germany. The procedure involved grafting shoots of plants that branched poorly onto seedlings of the same species that had a branching habit of growth. Ecke grafted brightly colored poinsettia shoots from mature, elongated plants onto multi-branched poinsettia seedlings. The elongated shoots would soon start to branch under the influence of the branched seedlings.

It wasn’t until the 1990s that a botanist from the USDA would divine the mystery of turning elongated poinsettias into compact plants. A bacteria known as a phytoplasma that lives in the sap of branching plants migrates from the sap of the seedling rootstock into the sap of the grafted scion shoot, encouraging it to branch. This phytoplasma continues to live in cuttings cloned from the grafted plants, making it possible to mass-produce multi-branched, compact poinsettia cultivars. Conclusive proof of the bacteria’s influence on branching is demonstrated by application of antibiotics to branched poinsettia plants. Soon after the antibiotics are circulating in the multi-branched plants, branching ceases and all you get is elongated growth.

You can maintain your poinsettia as an indoor plant for years as long as you are diligent in its care. Keep your poinsettia next to your brightest window, but away from the burning hot sun. As January begins, if not before, some of the colorful leaflike bracts will begin to fade and then fall off. Within three to twelve weeks, depending on the variety of poinsettia that you have, there will be nothing but leafless stems to look at.

Cut the stems back to a height of six to eight inches. At this point, you will want to water sparingly, if at all, keeping the soil just moist enough so that the stems do not shrivel.

Around May 1st, new leaves should begin to appear. Each time you water – and you should do so frequently once the plant has leafed out – fertilize with a water-soluble product (such as Miracle-Gro) at one-quarter strength of the recommended dosage. You should repot into the next largest-sized container (from six-inch to eight-inch, for example) at this time.

Starting in the middle of September, keep your poinsettia in the dark by putting a black plastic bag over it or by placing it in a closet, from 5 p.m. until 8 a.m. Just like chrysanthemums, which won’t bloom if planted under street lights, poinsettias need long nights, uninterrupted by any light whatsoever, to flower and color up. If you should briefly shine a flashlight in the closet where your poinsettia is spending the night, it may not turn color in December. If you don’t care when your poinsettia turns red, leave it next to a bright window all year long and it will color up in February.

Plant your poinsettia in the garden after it produces leaves in the spring. Poinsettias are highly picky about soil. Without superior soil drainage, they will die of root rot, so make sure your soil is sandy or heavily amended with compost. A half-day sun exposure is recommended. Although frost-sensitive, especially when young, I have seen poinsettias growing in gardens as far north as Granada Hills.

Have you had success growing a poinsettia in your garden? You are invited to email me the details of your experience, along with your location, for publication in this column.

Poinsettia (Euphorbia pulcherrima) was given its popular name as a tribute to Joel R. Poinsett who, as the first U.S. ambassador to Mexico in 1825, sent samples of the eponymous plants to his native South Carolina. Later, he developed a business selling poinsettia stems from plants that he grew and propagated in greenhouses. It was left to the Eckes to market and establish them as a plant associated with the Christmas season.

Note: When picking out a poinsettia, make sure the yellow flower buds, surrounded by the colorful bracts, are closed. Poinsettias with closed buds at time of purchase maintain their vitality before fading for a longer time than poinsettias whose flowers buds are open.

Tip of the Week: There are two times of the year when you can propagate your poinsettia from cuttings. When the little yellow flowers in the center of your leaflike poinsettia bracts begin to fade in February or March, you can propagate your plant by detaching six to eight-inch stem cuttings. You would want to do this pruning in any case once your poinsettia goes dormant. After dipping the cuttings in root hormone, insert the bottom third of the cuttings in a fast-draining sterile soil medium consisting of half sand and half perlite or half sand and half vermiculite. Alternatively, you can wait until weather warms in spring or even summer when shoots start to sprout from the base of your plant that you received the previous winter. Detach these small three to four inch shoots and give them the same treatment described above for the longer shoots. A transparent plastic bag loosely covering the plant will create a greenhouse effect and speed up the rooting process.

You can also propagate poinsettias from seed. To produce the fruits or pods in which poinsettia seeds are found, take a cotton swab and dab it on the pollen that forms on the tiny yellow flowers before they fade. Brush the pollen onto other flowers or onto the same flower from which the pollen came since each poinsettia flower contains both male and female parts and the flowers do self-pollinate. After the seed pods form and the plant begins to enter dormancy as its bracts fade, remove the green pods and place them in a paper bag. When pods turn brown and dry, remove the seeds and place them in a sandwich bag filled with a 50:50 mix of moist sand and peat moss and put them in the refrigerator for three months. You can then plant the seeds one inch deep in a fast draining soil mix and you should see them sprout within three weeks.

Please send questions, comments, and photos to joshua@perfectplants.com