Types of Coleus – Sun, Shade, or Trailer

Choose coleus by the light you have: a sun kind for open ground, a chartreuse leaf that wants afternoon shade, or a trailer for a basket.

Choose a sun coleus, a shade coleus, or a trailer

Read the tag for light before you buy. Decide the site first, then the color. A “sun” or “sun and shade” tag is the open-bed plant. A shade tag, or a lime leaf with no sun line, wants morning sun and afternoon cover. [1] Darker red, burgundy, and bronze leaves usually hold in more light. Chartreuse and gold bleach if the afternoon is hot and dry. A west wall with reflected heat is a sun job only if the tag says so and you can water. [2] Upright kinds fill a bed or sit as the tall plant in a pot. A trailer is the rim plant, not a second keep-alive. Site and water stay on How to Grow Coleus.

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Sun and sun-or-shade

Coleosaurus and Henna sit on sun-trial lists. Heartbreaker and Pineapple hold color in sun or part shade if the soil stays moist. Buy these when the bed is open and you can water in heat.

Chartreuse and lime

Gay's Delight is a lime leaf with purple veins. Lime Time and Golden Dreams are the same job: afternoon shade so the yellow-green does not bleach. Use them on an east wall or under high shade, not on hot pavers.

Trailing

Chocolate Drop is a trailer for a basket rim or pot edge. Care is the same moist mix; the habit is the shop job. Do not use an upright mound as a spiller.

Pick the group, then the cultivar. Extra shop names are not extra kinds. Kong and Wizard are shade or seed series we do not hold as cards; treat a Kong tag as full shade and a large leaf. [3] ColorBlaze and similar vegetative series sit in the sun-or-shade group unless the tag says trailer. Seed mixes are a packet of mixed seedlings, not a copy of the plant in your hand. [4] Sow a mix on Growing Coleus from Seed if you want that grab-bag start.

If the tag does not name sun or shade, match the leaf: dark for open ground, lime for afternoon shade.