How to Grow Butterfly Pea Plant (Aparajita): Seed, Support, Care (Video)

Transcript

Can you grow blue-flower vines on a balcony in just two months?

Can you grow blue-flower vines on a balcony in just two months?

Butterfly Pea on Balcony

I'll show you how to grow butterfly pea on a balcony and reveal the trick to keep its blue colour vivid.

Pick the right plant

Nurseries usually carry two forms, the single flower that looks like a tiny blue conch, and a double that’s a bit fuller. Both climb and bloom the same, but the double tends to set fewer pods, so if you want to harvest seed for next year, keep at least one single plant. Choose the classic blue if your goal is tea, and you’ll be set.

Seed preparation

The seed coat is hard, so give it a gentle sandpaper rub or a rough tile swipe to dull a spot. Then soak the seeds in lukewarm water for eight to twelve hours, they’ll swell and look plump. Plant two or three seeds about one and a half centimetre deep in a mix of garden soil, compost and coarse sand, water once and keep the surface just damp.

Sunlight needed

Your vine needs at least six hours of direct sunlight each day to push out those blue blossoms. In hotter regions a little afternoon shade can help, but anything under four hours will give you only foliage, no flowers.

Pot and support

Give the plant a pot that holds at least twelve to fifteen litres, think a ten-inch bucket minimum. Set a nylon or jute net, an iron grill, or a thin railing nearby so the vines have something to twine around. Tie them loosely so they don’t girdle the stem, and you’ll have a light, airy trellis that can hold several metres of growth.

Minimum pot size

A twelve- tore-litre container gives the roots enough room to spread and the vine enough stability to climb without toppling over when the monsoon rains make the foliage heavy.

Water, feed, growth

In the hot months of May and June, water the plant deeply every morning, a morning soak helps the soil dry before night. Add a handful of compost once a month; the pea fixes its own nitrogen, so heavy fertiliser will just make a green wall with few blooms. In the monsoon, only water when the top three centimetres are dry, and in winter water sparingly, cold, wet soil is more lethal than cold air.

Why not flowering?

If you’re seeing only leaves, check four sun exposure first, under four hours the plant stays vegetative. Excess nitrogen, especially from urea or rich manure, pushes leaf growth at the expense of flowers. A pot that’s too small or dries out daily also stresses the vine. Finally, remember that seedlings sown late in the year may not flower until the days cool down.

The one colour keeper

Here’s the secret to keeping those petals a deep, lasting blue: harvest the blossoms first thing in the morning after the dew has dried, then spread them flat on paper in a shaded spot. Sun-drying turns them grey-violet within days, but shade-drying preserves the vivid hue for months when you store the dried flowers in a sealed glass jar.

Like, subscribe and comment

Useful? Like and subscribe, and tell us in the comments what we should check next.

Read the full guide

Read the complete guide on thecareonline.com. This is general information, not medical advice.