How to Care Cupheas

The fatty acids produced by Cuphea platycentra show similarities to that of palm oil, potentially giving rise to an alternative source for use in the soapmaking industry. The red, tubular flowers with an ashy appearing tip give this plant its commonly referenced name of "cigar flower."

A native of Mexico and parts of Central America, false heather is a small unassuming plant that makes a great addition to beds and borders. It has attractive evergreen foliage and when in bloom has lavender, white, or purple flowers. In the state of Hawaii, this naturalized plant is regarded as a weed.

Blue waxweed is an herbaceous annual with tiny reddish-purple blooms that are extremely attractive to butterflies and hummingbirds. The stems have a gummy texture, giving it both one of its alternative names, tarweed, and the second part of its Latin name, Cuphea viscosissima, from the Latin *viscidus* (which roughly translates to "sticky").

Cuphea ignea, the cigar plant, cigar flower, firecracker plant, or Mexican cigar, is a species of flowering plant in the genus Cuphea of the family Lythraceae. It is a tropical, densely branched evergreen subshrub. This species, native to Mexico and the West Indies, produces small, tubular, bright red to orange flowers. Each flower is tipped with a thin, white rim and two small purple-black petals. The flower is said to resemble a lit cigar plant, hence the name ignea, which comes from the Latin for "fire". The leaves are small, elliptical and of a bright green color. It grows to about 61 cm. In temperate regions Cuphea ignea requires a warm, sheltered spot, as it does not tolerate frost. Alternatively, it may be grown under glass or indoors as a houseplant. In the UK, this plant has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit (confirmed 2017).

False heather offers white flowers in marked contrast to the parent’s mauve blooms. This explains part of its scientific name Cuphea hyssopifolia 'Alba': ‘alba’ is Latin for white. This low-growing evergreen plant is ideally suited to rock gardens and containers. It isn’t fussy about soil or sunlight, thriving in a variety of soils under full sun or part shade.

The mass of bright red or orange tubular flowers of the cigar plant (Cuphea hookeriana) make it a popular ornamental plant, suitable for the garden or as a container plant. It is neat, fast-growing, and easy to care for, but it is tender to frost. It attracts hummingbirds and butterflies.

Duabanga is a small genus of lowland evergreen rainforest trees in southeast Asia, comprising two or three species.

Lawsonia has a sole species. Lawsonia is a tall shrub or small tree, standing 1.8 to 8 m tall. It is glabrous and multi-branched, with spine-tipped branchlets. The leaves are glabrous, sub-sessile, elliptical, and lanceolate, acuminate, and have depressed veins on the dorsal surface. Its petals are ovate, with white or red stamens found in pairs on the rim of the calyx tube. Lawsonia fruits are small, brownish capsules, with 32–49 seeds per fruit, and open irregularly into four splits. The lawsonia plant is native to northern Africa, western and southern Asia, and northern Australia, in semi-arid zones and tropical areas.

Decodon consist of a single species, Decodon verticillatus, a wetland specialist plant native to eastern North America. It can grow in dense thickets and is therefore not recommended for domestic gardens but its draping willow-like branches can add interest to larger water features in parks and larger spaces.

The crape myrtles (Lagerstroemia) are a group of flowering evergreen shrubs and trees, most of which are tropical or sub-tropical. Crape myrtles respond well to trimming, bear large and beautiful clusters of flowers, and are today used extensively in landscaping. Some crape myrtles, such as the Guava Crape Myrtle (L. calyculata) can reach large-tree sizes and are occasionally harvested for their timber, although it is of fairly low value.

The loosestrifes (Lythrum) are a fairly small group of flowering, herbaceous plants. Many loosestrifes prefer very wet soils and so are strongly associated with habitats like marshes, bogs, and other wetlands. Bearing spikes of showy flowers, several loosestrifes are popular ornamentals, however, some ornamental species' hardiness and aggressive growth habits have turned them into invasives.