Is Caladium deer resistant?

Grown entirely for the patterned leaves, and one of very few things that gives strong color in deep shade. Tubers must be lifted before frost and stored dry and warm, not cold, which is where most people lose them. Calcium oxalate makes every part an irritant.

Do deer eat caladiums?

Sometimes, and more than the chemistry suggests. Rutgers rates the genus Occasionally Severely Damaged, the third tier, and NC State's entry says nothing about deer at all, so the tier rests on Rutgers alone. Every part of the plant carries calcium oxalate, and NC State rates the poison severity Medium, "severe pain around the mouth, including burning and swelling of the lips and tongue." Deer eat it anyway, which puts caladium with hosta among the shade plants where toxicity fails to predict browsing. A big soft leaf at knee height in July is the thing a deer tests regardless of what is in it.

Where it grows

NC State: hardy only in zones 9a to 10b, 6 inches to 2 feet, in dappled or partial shade, and grown everywhere else from tubers set out after the soil warms and lifted before frost. The ASPCA lists caladium as toxic to dogs, cats and horses; NC State adds that "ingestion by livestock or pets may cause death," and the callout below carries it.

Protecting caladiums

A bed of caladiums under trees is the impatiens problem again: fence it, spray it on a schedule and expect losses, or grow it in pots close to the house. The 20 percent egg spray Colorado State rates High needs renewing at about thirty days through the season, which is three or four applications between planting and frost.

If it is browsed

The tuber sends new leaves within weeks in warm weather, and a plant browsed in July is back by August. What it cannot afford is the last browse of the season, because the tuber ripens on the foliage it keeps, and a tuber lifted from a stripped plant stores badly.