Weigela florida ‘Tango’
Hardy in zones 4 through 8.
I think Tango Weigela is an awesome plant and it’s a crazy hot seller for me. It is one of the more compact weigelas and has redish, purple dark leaves with flowers that are red to deep red.
This is one of those plants that I love recommending to people because I know it will work out well for them. Some plants, I can barely bring myself to recommend to a customer. If a plant doesn’t appeal to me I have a difficult time suggesting somebody else buy it and plants like that usually get purged from my nursery fairly quickly.
Tango Weigela blooms like crazy in the spring then continues to sporadically make flowers all through the summer right on into the fall. The deep red flowers contrast nicely against the dark maroon leaves.
This plant can easily be kept trimmed to a height and width of 18″ if that’s what you need or if left untrimmed it can get 3′ wide and high. It responds well to pruning and a mid summer pruning usually stimulates a new batch of flowers.
Tango Weigela is very easy to grow and very easy to propagate. This is a plant that propagates easily from softwood cuttings starting mid June (mid May in warmer states) and you can continue to stick cuttings right up until the ground freezes in the winter. The only time that I would not attempt to propagate this plant is in the early spring when the new growth is too soft to work with.
For a complete understanding of how to propagate this plant both winter and summer see these two articles.
Easy Summer Plant Propagation.
Easy Winter Plant Propagation.
Both rooted cuttings and liners of Tango Weigela are both a big hit in The Buy/Sell Section of Our Members Area, usually selling out very quickly.
A rooted cutting is exactly as it sounds, a cutting, pretty much a stick, with some leaves and roots on the bottom. A liner is a rooted cutting that has been grown out for one growing season. It is starting to branch out and has a much heavier root system than a rooted cutting.
Liners of course bring more money than rooted cuttings but are still small enough to ship just about anywhere in a Box like This One that Nathan Sent Me Full of Plants.
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Questions or comments? Post them below and I’ll answer them for you.
Jackie says
Hi Mike. Just found your sight and really enjoy reading about all the different plants. I bought several wine and roses weigela’s and planted them to form a hedge by planting about 20 to 24 inches apart two years ago. It’s spring here in MO now and they are blooming like crash. My question is that a few seem to be long and lanky and not as full in the middle as they others. Can you suggest what I need to do to thicken them up. I know I need to wait to prune after they finish blooming. Appreciate your thoughts.
Mike says
Jackie,
Pruning should easily solve the problem. Just cut the tops off, making them all even.
Juliana Smith says
Are there many different kinds of weigela? We have one that looks just like the ones in the pictures above. Could I call it Tango Weiglea or should I just tell my customers(When I get customers) that it is a kind of weigela?
I wish I could post a picture,
Juliana
Mike says
Juliana,
There are many kinds and some are patented. That’s why you shouldn’t propagate the one you have. Buy a couple of properly labeled plants that you know you can legally propagate. See this; For years and years and years this has been my rant;
http://freeplants.com/rant.htm