3/19/2026

Poinsettias with Paint and Glitter

This is my second blog about poinsettias because after I moved from California to Missouri I discovered that I could actually keep them outside all summer. In 2025 I planted several poinsettias in a shade location where they only got a little tiny bit of sun in the late afternoon. Only one of them survived and you can see that one here in my first blog.

They can also grow outside in California and sometimes even in San Francisco. However they don’t like the persistently cold foggy conditions and they prefer warm moist air. This makes the Midwest an ideal growing environment for poinsettias which originated in Mexico and Central America.

This year 2026 I wanted to do something different so I bought a large number of them the day after Christmas. They may go on sale for only $0.99 each in grocery or other big box stores. I decided to buy some poinsettias with painted leaves and some of them with natural leaves to see if the paint and glitter caused any sort of issues with the plants.

I decided to leave the bracts (which look like flowers) upon the plant because I found that it’s not detrimental to leave them on. But one could actually remove the flowers (very small in the center of the bracts) because there’s no point in the plant wasting its energy making seeds.  I discovered that sometimes the bracts can actually begin to generate chlorophyll over time. I noticed some of the bracts turning slightly green over time.

The reason I had a very low survival rate in 2025 is I planted them too early; then we had an unexpected snow in May. I had not transplanted them before I transplanted them outside so the pots were too small as well for proper root growth.

This year I transplanted all of them into larger pots using a mix of coconut core and perlite. The original poinsettias were packed in 100% peat moss which is not good for the roots ability to breathe.

 I’m going to slowly introduce them to the outside conditions to acclimate them. So I’ve been putting them outside in the shade when the weather is warmer than 60° Fahrenheit.

For the experiment I have purchased two plants that are identical except one of them has gold paint on the leaves. Today I’m going to start to measure their growth.  They seem to be on an equal playing field now. I don’t see new growth on either one of these plants. Once I slowly acclimate them I will either leave them in pots and bring them in when it gets really hot or I might plant some of them in the ground. I have a large number of them right now.

For the experiment I intend to keep these both under equal conditions to see if the gold paint is actually an impediment to them producing new leaves. I imagine that it would be because the chlorophyll is blocked by the paint.

Last year I also did not bother place them in a closet for 12 hours at night and the one that bloomed developed very odd blooms. This year I will see if I can make them rebloom by placing them in the complete dark for 12 hours and then light for 12 hours.

I will update this blog at the end of the summer.

• Gardening