Lantana

Our lantana had stopped blooming and had become a mass of woody twigs. An article in Phoenix Home and Garden advised cutting back to a few inches. The article explained that lavender lantana blooms in spring and fall while yellow colored varieties are summer bloomers. As each variety dies back it is beneficial to cut them back to assure they issue profuse blooms during their flowering periods.

Lantana needs no fertilizer and does well in the low desert without high water requirements. We have yellow , lavender and a mixed fuchsia variety. The lavender lantana is in bloom now. The yellow and fuchsia varieties have been cut back.

These plants make excellent ground cover, retard weed growth and have little litter. Our fuchsia variety forms large seeds upon which the resident mocking birds feed.