How to Grow Red Lobster Claw Heliconia

Fancy, Huh?

The Tropical Grower is featuring another one of our favorites this week with How to Grow Red Lobster Claw Heliconia. Its large thin paddle leaf stalks are distinctly Tropical, filling an area and finishing with the amazing bright Red Lobster Claws. We loved the red show so much, I transplanted it into several places last year. Knowing the good and the bad, we still wanted more.

My Mom received the original plant as a gift from her friend. He grew it in his yard and sent a gallon pot with a giant stalk. It looked exactly like ginger. In fact, we thought it was some kind of Giant Red Ginger. For years. It wasn’t until I had done a little research that we realized we were idiots. Surprise! It’s pretty distinct. No missing it, you’d think. It was a good thing it grows pretty much the same as Ginger.

Tropical

Heliconia are most definitely Tropical plants with some of the kookiest, amazingly unique flowers on the planet, rivaling some of the orchids. There’s about 200 in the genus. So, you can grow them and experience their weirdness in person, but if you live in a place where it frosts, you should plant them in a pot for survival. These don’t like cold at all.

Even our Zone 10a is technically a no-no for the Red Lobster Claw Heliconia rostrata. They prefer Zone 10b-11 where it’s frost-free. Our two whole nights below 32 are an issue. Chuckling here. Ours grow fine. We cover one side on frost nights because the nursery is there, and they’re tall enough to hang the covers from. LOL! That being said, it’s sort of sheltered in the area it’s planted. My understanding is growers have them throughout central Florida, covering or sheltering them from frost.

**Some see hot pink, green, and yellow. If you stare at it, you probably will too, but they look red and yellow walking through the garden.**

Red Lobster Claw Heliconia Rostrata

We obviously didn’t choose the Red Lobster Claw, but we are so happy it came to live in Our Garden. It’s a hanging Heliconia because the flowers actually hang down from the stalk, and the yellow and red parts aren’t technically the flowers at all, just the covers to the tiny yellow flowers inside. All of it looks like the pretty flower part to me.

Others don’t see yellow and red at all, they refer to it as hot pink, yellow, and green. Humm? I’ve stared at them for a while, specifically for color identification, and I can see it. If I’m looking. Since it’s Bolivia’s national flower, I’m definitely not going to argue. But, in Our Garden, when I’m passing by or working, the hanging claws look red and yellow to me. They certainly catch the eye.

Perennials

**The yellow flowers live inside the Lobster Claws.**

I read somewhere they were Evergreen Perennials, and it made a whole lot of sense to me, even though I only saw it once. While I have also read they require a dormant period of no growth, that has not been our experience. The growth does slow down, with no new shoots, in the winter, but I would hardly call it dormant. Ours start sending up stalk shoots in March/April, heavily in May and June when it starts to bloom, but the stalks grow all year.

The stalk shoots start to emerge just before the rains and kick into high gear once they start. While you can’t see it, it’s also when the Rhizomes send out their Rhizome shoots. So, those little buggers under the ground start getting really active. Then, when the rains start, the new Rhizome shoots send up all their stalk shoots from their new locations.

**After Hurricane Ian. The storm simply thinned these out. Everything has grown since then. The area stays green all year, but each stalk only has a year lifespan.**

The stalks grow all year until May/June when they send out their beautiful Red Lobster Claws over their flowers. When the flowers are spent or the hanging Claws are so heavy they make the stalk fall over, the whole stalk dies. Yeah, it’s blooming at the same time new stalks are coming up. In this way, the area never dies, and it becomes an Evergreen Perennial. Pretty cool, and excellent for screening because it’s there all year..

Yes, It’s A Rhizome

The Lobster Claw grows from a Rhizome, which is similar to a bulb. It’s a plant growing both below and above the ground, and it looks like a bunch of big tentacles. It also is very similar to the emerging stalk which grows directly out of the Rhizome tentacle.

Each Rhizome can send up several stalks and will eventually send out more Rhizome tentacles which plant and send up their own stalks. Since each Rhizome travels at least a foot from the original Rhizome before planting, you can imagine how quickly this spreads into a large area. So, confinement is necessary. Use a strong root barrier. For more on planting and tending Rhizomes, check out How to Grow Bulbs and Rhizomes

Plan Your Area Carefully

The stalks get big, and while not bushy, they do each have a couple of sets of extremely large paddle shaped leaves. Think, banana leaves. While I have consistently read you should expect 3 to 6 feet in landscaping, that has not been our experience. Maybe the first couple of years. Ours are topping 8-10 feet, maybe 12 in the back next to tree stumps. Originally, I thought up to 7 feet, but the evidence doesn’t lie. There are lots of pics. The ones in the back leaned, so it was hard to tell.

The Red Lobster Claw is big, and it just keeps expanding. The Ian only took out the stalks, all the Rhizomes were just fine. The only thing not back at this point is the height. Every year they’ve grown taller since we planted them, except this one.

Because of their size and quick growth, the natural thought would be screening, and you would be right, it is excellent at screening. However, I would not plant this close to a fence unless you have a 100% ability to block several feet down for its entire existence. Yup, for-ev-er. Don’t be lazy or dismissive about it. This stuff is going to find its way through the weak. Tough stuff, and it’s NO FUN cutting out of a fence. Pretty sure it could eventually knock it over.

It’s going to grow up and out. Under the ground first and then up. You are going to be surprised where. We currently have an 8 foot circle, and it’s fighting hard for more. Up and out, big time, in feet. Plan accordingly.

Our Garden

**Adding a strap around the bottom helps keep the stalks, heavy with hanging flowers, upright. It also keeps them growing inside its designated circle.**

Our Eugenia shrubs had grown into 25-30 foot trees. They were part of the original hedge maze My Mom created for My Son in the early days of Our Garden. Unfortunately, they were starting to die from a parasite. The nasty thing is an Aerial plant in case you were wondering, and we needed something in the area to offer some shade because our Tree & Shrub Nursery is to the west. Since these were supposed to grow tall quickly and we had a pot of them, winner.

The area was depressed from removing some of the big tree trunks, meaning there was less soil in this sort of ‘pot hole’. I left a few of the bigger trunks along the backside for confinement and shade, there were a couple of live branches and a Variegated Golden Giant Pothos was growing up one. So, I wanted to save them if I could. Yes, I did this all alone, Lumberjill Style, felling trees. Don’t do this alone. Just saying. All of these things were perfect for planting the Red Lobster Claw, and we didn’t even know. We were planting Ginger. Sometimes things turn out good.

Planting A Happy Zone

These are an expansion. Digging up stalks with their Rhizomes transplant surprisingly well. But be warned, the planted stalk will immediately die. It will send up a new stalk as soon as the Rhizome is situated.

Unless you don’t care about these spreading out in feet every year until they take over your yard, confining the things or trimming Rhizomes is necessary. Even the big dead tree trunks in Our Garden didn’t hold them for long. We’ve had to dig up wandering Rhizomes for the last couple of years. We’re going to have to sink something, I just haven’t decided what to stop them.

These are Tropicals, and their natural soil is sandy and well draining. They also love water and enjoy a consistently moist soil. Having the depression in the soil where the trees were removed allowed all the water to run into this area. At the bottom was straight Yard Sand. All the dead tree trunks and roots in the area were chopped with a shovel and mixed into the sand with Compost. It was chunkier than Black Sand, but most of the woody stuff was on top.

I say all this because I later learned the Red Lobster Claws actually like a wood chunk bark and/or peat to help keep them moist. It is actually recommended in any potting soil mix if you are going with planting it in a pot.

But be warned, the planted stalk will immediately die when replanted. It will send up a new stalk as soon as the Rhizome is situated, but the one you plant will most likely die. It’s happened every single time I’ve transplanted them.

Not Wetland Plants

These are also transplants, and they’re a little further into the dry detention area than I would prefer. But, they lived through the extreme flooding during Ian. So, I think its fine, actually expanding.

Red Lobster Claws are not wetland plants. Don’t confuse liking a little extra water from a slight depression in a totally dry yard for growing in water. Do not plant them in standing water, even if it’s just standing for part of the year. You will rot the Rhizomes.

While I didn’t kill the ones I planted in the dry detention area, the area only holds water in extreme flood events, and no, a typical hurricane or tropical storm is not extreme. While extreme weather, not extreme flooding for our yard. 100 year flood events like Hurricane Irma or Ian, yes, but we didn’t hold water for Charlie or Wilma. So, brief flooding, and they lived. However, prolonged wet is not good. Do not plant these in your seasonal flood areas. You know, where your yard is soggy, near the drainage ditch holding water in the summer or near the water line, even if it’s dry there in the winter. You’ll be sorry.

Nutrients

The Claws receive the standard yearly Spring application of the 10-15% neutral slow-release granular fertilizer with the rest of Our Garden. We’re currently using Osmocote Smart Release Plant Food. We are especially fond of the slow-release and burn protection since this is an across Our Garden application. It also leaves the crunchy ball husks instead of the styrofoam balls some fertilizers use. Those mix into the soil just fine.

If you are using a spray application fertilizer and not a slow release, you’ll have to hit them again every 2 months until the end of rainy season. We only do the single application, and the depression it is planted in has become is a giant natural compost pile. We regularly layer in browns and greens. For more on Natural Composting see How to Compost at Home.

Maintenance

**Do you see all the new shoots out past the boarders. These need to be removed and the Rhizomes under the ground need to be transplanted or composted. Yeah, maintenance. These are not easy grows.**

Yes, absolutely, these are perennials and require maintenance. Now, how much you do will depend on how well you have confined it or planned an area for it. The stalks are going to die, yearly, and will need to be removed. Interestingly enough, they recommend you remove dead flowers, a.k.a. Lobster Claws and dead leaves. Uh. Okay.

The Tropical Grower, Tropical Grower, Growing Tropical, Flowers — **Growing Red Lobster Claw Heliconia is highly rewarding. This is last year’s big baby.**

We sometimes remove them for aesthetics, looking at dead stuff in the garden is no fun, but we don’t usually trim dead leaves of flowers. When they die, the stalk dies, and we just remove the whole stalk. It’s going to fall over anyway. The leaves do not shed. They are with the stalk throughout its life cycle. If damaged, they usually just split and continue to grow. So, we don’t have to usually trim anything until we’re ready to remove the whole dead stalk.