EVANSIANA 
O 
A Herbaceous Perennial Begonia 
Begonia Evansiana will be a pride and joy from 
the time it is planted, about the first of June 
until frost. In the second season and every year 
thereafter, they will appear about the 15th of 
June and they begin blooming in August and con¬ 
tinue until frost. They colonize well, and with 
the addition of fresh leaf mold each year, have 
been known to thrive in the same location for 
fifty years. 
So often Evansiana is the solution of the prob¬ 
lem as to the plant to use in that shady spot. Its 
requirements are the same as for all other Be¬ 
gonias, a light and porous soil, acid in nature, 
that will hold the moisture and will not become 
water-logged. Should you decide to make the 
bed under a tree, build up the bed, in other words, 
coarse gravel on the bottom, next a layer of peat 
is very desirable, then a layer of sandy soil, fol¬ 
lowed by your leaf mold. Make the bed at least 
a couple of weeks before you place your plants. 
A generous sprinkling of Arsenate of lead and 
sand mixed will assure you that there are no 
worms, etc., in the soil. Make your first planting 
about nine inches apart and in three to five years 
you will have one of the most beautiful beds of 
Perennial Begonia Evansiana that one could 
desire. 
It grows about 2 ft. high, the foliage a beauti¬ 
ful light green with a smooth appearance above 
and on the underside the veins are bright red, 
sometimes the older leaves are entirely red on the 
underside. The flowers are large and rose pink, 
with male and female blooms, as in all Begonias, 
on a rather long stem. When they are through 
blooming in the fall, they start to die down, 
small bulblets form and drop onto the bed and 
these form new plants for the next season. There 
is one very important thing to remember:—DO 
NOT DISTURB THE BED IN THE SPRING— 
leave last year’s bulbs or tubers to come up in 
their own way, along with the new bulblets. Us¬ 
ually the growth does not start to show until the 
ground is warm. 
After the first heavy freeze cover the bed, but 
not too thickly, with coarse leaf mold, repeat this 
every year. If your winters should be too long 
and too cold for this perennial Begonia, just lift 
the tubers (soil and all) up in a fairly deep box, 
and keep in a cool atmosphere that does not reach 
freezing very often, and plant out again the next 
spring after hard freezing is over. 
The specie was discovered in 1804 by the 
English, and definitely named Evansiana in 1812 
by them. 
