The Cape Fuchsia is native to South Africa, but surprisingly quite a hardy perennial. Plants make a bushy, upright mound of green foliage, bearing showy clusters of fuchsia-like firecracker flowers beginning in mid-summer and continuing into the autumn. Capensis has brilliant orange-red blooms with a yellow throat that attracts hummingbirds in its native habitat. These adapt well to containers, and in cold winter areas may be wintered indoors. Plants form a woody base and should be pruned back to 6 inches or so each spring. We managed to grow these quite happily against a south facing wall in Oxfordshire for many years.
