The Plantita life: Mayana Love
I resisted the Mayana craze for a long time. I thought to myself that the colourful leaves reminded me of old school “lola” type gardens and I didn’t want that look for my yard. But it turns out that its affordability and the immediate need for garden borders on the side of my house would be the deciding factor in finally giving in and planting a variety of Mayana for my garden. I bought an assortment of Mayana plants from my suki (Manong JR’s Online Shop) and promptly had them planted on ground near my house. The area gets full morning sun and just a bit of shade toward late afternoon.
I didn’t know much about mayanas when I bought them, only that they are very colourful bushes that many plantitas like to cultivate in their gardens or in pots.
I planted them in the middle of summer and for a while thought that they would die on me. The summer sun had them wilting every afternoon and we had to do twice daily watering to keep my baby mayanas alive.
Fortunately, they were hardy enough to survive the brunt of the summer sun and when the wet season came my mayanas started to thrive and flourish. Oh they have become such beauties! I finally fell in love with my colourful “lola” bushes.
It turns out that mayanas are not only hardy. They are fast growing bushes that need constant pruning to keep their rounded bush shape.
Another wonderful thing about them is that they are so easy to propagate. You basically just have to stick the cuttings in soil and viola! In a week’s time you have a planting with new roots!
The regular pruning and trimming to keep their shape have wielded whole batches of new plantings that I have put to ground in our farm’s new pathway. The pathway’s mayanas are still babies but we are excited to see them become bright colourful bushes on our field.
I did a little research on mayanas and found out that they are actually considered as herbal plants in other tropical countries and even used in traditional medicine in places like Mexico and Malaysia. The mayana plant has been used since ancient times to treat heart diseases like hypertension and respiratory disorders such as asthma. It is also used in wound treatment and as an anti inflammatory medicine to reduce swelling. Isn’t that lovely information about these beauties? They aren’t only pretty but they are healing plants!
So far my mayanas have been ornamental and I haven’t actually tried to ingest them as a herbal tonic (might need to do more research for that) but it’s good to know that the colourful bushes I spend my afternoons trimming constantly have health benefits as well.
In one of my plant enthusiast groups on facebook, I once saw a post on tempura mayana leaves. They cooked it like kangkong or kamote chips. I looked at it and thought, oh no no no no no! I will not eat my pretty mayana leaves. But now that I have read it has health benefits, perhaps we could try making mayana chips in the future. After all, I do throw away a lot of the leaves when cuttings are planted in our nursery. I may write about that soon. In the meantime, I have bushes to trim!
Sources:
Potential of Different Coleus blumei Tissues for Rosmarinic Acid Production, by Nataša Bauer,1,§ Rosemary Vuković,2,§ Saša Likić,3 and Sibila Jelaska1
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068421/
https://www.emedicinehealth.com/coleus/vitamins-supplements.htm
I didn’t know much about mayanas when I bought them, only that they are very colourful bushes that many plantitas like to cultivate in their gardens or in pots.
I planted them in the middle of summer and for a while thought that they would die on me. The summer sun had them wilting every afternoon and we had to do twice daily watering to keep my baby mayanas alive.
Fortunately, they were hardy enough to survive the brunt of the summer sun and when the wet season came my mayanas started to thrive and flourish. Oh they have become such beauties! I finally fell in love with my colourful “lola” bushes.
It turns out that mayanas are not only hardy. They are fast growing bushes that need constant pruning to keep their rounded bush shape.
Another wonderful thing about them is that they are so easy to propagate. You basically just have to stick the cuttings in soil and viola! In a week’s time you have a planting with new roots!
The regular pruning and trimming to keep their shape have wielded whole batches of new plantings that I have put to ground in our farm’s new pathway. The pathway’s mayanas are still babies but we are excited to see them become bright colourful bushes on our field.
I did a little research on mayanas and found out that they are actually considered as herbal plants in other tropical countries and even used in traditional medicine in places like Mexico and Malaysia. The mayana plant has been used since ancient times to treat heart diseases like hypertension and respiratory disorders such as asthma. It is also used in wound treatment and as an anti inflammatory medicine to reduce swelling. Isn’t that lovely information about these beauties? They aren’t only pretty but they are healing plants!
So far my mayanas have been ornamental and I haven’t actually tried to ingest them as a herbal tonic (might need to do more research for that) but it’s good to know that the colourful bushes I spend my afternoons trimming constantly have health benefits as well.
In one of my plant enthusiast groups on facebook, I once saw a post on tempura mayana leaves. They cooked it like kangkong or kamote chips. I looked at it and thought, oh no no no no no! I will not eat my pretty mayana leaves. But now that I have read it has health benefits, perhaps we could try making mayana chips in the future. After all, I do throw away a lot of the leaves when cuttings are planted in our nursery. I may write about that soon. In the meantime, I have bushes to trim!
Sources:
Potential of Different Coleus blumei Tissues for Rosmarinic Acid Production, by Nataša Bauer,1,§ Rosemary Vuković,2,§ Saša Likić,3 and Sibila Jelaska1
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5068421/
https://www.emedicinehealth.com/coleus/vitamins-supplements.htm
