I just found out that mine is Coleus. Genus of Cuban oregano and a ton of other cool plants like the Hausa potato and Livingstone potato. Apart of the family Lamiaceae, which is the same family as mint and deadnettles.
I just found out that mine is Coleus. Genus of Cuban oregano and a ton of other cool plants like the Hausa potato and Livingstone potato. Apart of the family Lamiaceae, which is the same family as mint and deadnettles.
That is absolutely a fascinating pick! I would have never considered observing a thorny plant for examples of symbiosis yet here it is. Truly one of the wonders of evolution. I came to my favorite by browsing Wikipedia, looking at Morinda citrifolia, and then for random stuff to edit and contribute to, while also researching some of my favorite plants like Coleus amboinicus. I absolutely love the plant and you can stick it basically anywhere. All this plant talk really makes me want to refocus on herb cultivation. Speaking of which, I’m curious if you know this plant that is also probably in the Lamiaceae family. I know it as balsam:
We have a few Morinda citrifolia tress in our backyard back in Mexico. This summer I went back to visit, and brought a strong UV flashlight with me to use it for finding scorpions. While looking by this tree I noticed that the fruits of that plant are very brightly fluorescent when ripe. Fruits usually become more fluorescent as they ripen, but Morinda citrifolia looked very dramatic.
Hmm, the plant looks similar to basil to me, but I don’t know what it is. I suppose it has some characteristic smell but that is hard to transmit via pictures!
Maybe you know this already, but a trick to identify the Lamiaceae is to cut a bit of a the stem and see if the cross section is a square. It is not a 100% accurate test, a few members don’t have a square cross-section and some members of other families do, but I personally haven’t run into any of the counter-examples.
That’s a fun little trick with Morinda citrifolia. Balsam is similar to basil, but it does have a bit of a different flavor and smell that’s kind of hard to describe. And I actually did not know that about Lamiaceae! I’ll definitely try it at some point.