Dichondra Argentea Green Surfer

Dichondra Argentea Green Surfer Seeds

(Dichondra argentea — BeGreen ApeX Seed Treatment — Benary )

Dichondra argentea Green Surfer is the green-foliage companion variety to the widely grown Silver Surfer, both developed by Benary using the BeGreen ApeX seed treatment technology. Silver Surfer features attractive silvery leaves, trailing growth up to 60 inches / 150 cm, and is an excellent choice for hanging baskets and mixed containers — also suitable as groundcover plant or for indoor use, with strong performance under hot and dry conditions. Green Surfer delivers all of these performance characteristics in fresh vivid green — creating a complementary foliage pair where Silver Surfer provides cool, luminous, metallic contrast and Green Surfer provides warm, lush, naturalistic depth.

The BeGreen ApeX seed treatment that both varieties share is a significant technical advantage. BeGreen is a chemical and micro-plastics-free priming and pelleting treatment. The advanced ApeX technology is used to break the sometimes-deep sleep of seeds and ensure optimum germination. The result is superior germination at 85% minimum and outstanding root development for faster growth — critical advantages for a foliage plant where the entire ornamental value depends on vigorous, branching stem development rather than flowering.

Dichondra argentea is a xerophytic, creeping, climbing, fast-growing plant reaching 4 inches high but growing 4 to 6 feet long — native to parts of New Mexico, Texas, Mexico, Colombia, Bolivia, northwest Argentina, and southeast Brazil. The species name argentea — Latin for silver — refers to the natural silver-grey coloration of the wild type, making Green Surfer a cultivar selection that expresses the green pigmentation more strongly than the typical silver form. The kidney-shaped leaves of both varieties are slightly cupped — a structural feature that catches and holds light differently at different angles, giving the foliage a dimensional quality absent from flat-leaved trailing plants.

Slightly cupped, disc-shaped leaves cascade along delicate stems and can grow up to 5 feet long — vigorous but not overwhelming, dichondra plays well with others. Excellent branching means it can also work well as ground cover. This co-operative character is the practical heart of Green Surfer’s value in container design: it fills space and cascades without overwhelming the flowering companion plants it is grown alongside, providing the structural trailing element that completes a mixed basket without competing for visual attention.

Variety Details

• Botanical Name: Dichondra argentea
• Variety: ‘Green Surfer’
• Breeder: Benary (Germany)
• Seed Technology: BeGreen ApeX — chemical and micro-plastics-free priming and pelleting
• Companion variety: Dichondra argentea ‘Silver Surfer’ — same series, silver foliage
• Common Names: Green Ponysfoot, Green Dichondra, Green Surfer
• Origin of species: North and Central America — Texas, Mexico, South America
• Seed Type: BeGreen ApeX treated
• Plant Type: Tender perennial grown as a cool-season annual
• Family: Convolvulaceae
• Foliage: Fresh vivid green — kidney-shaped, slightly cupped

Key Features

• Benary BeGreen ApeX technology — chemical and micro-plastics-free seed treatment ensuring 85%+ germination and superior root development
• Green-leafed companion to Silver Surfer — both varieties share identical cultural requirements and performance profile
• Vigorous self-branching trailing habit — cascading stems up to 150 cm with no pinching required
• Pure foliage plant — ornamental value entirely in texture, movement, and color contrast
• Fresh vivid green kidney-shaped cupped leaves — warm, naturalistic contrast to Silver Surfer’s cool metallic tones
• Exceptional heat and drought tolerance — thrives under conditions that stress most flowering ornamentals
• Low maintenance — no deadheading, no fertilizing beyond light feeding
• Suitable for hanging baskets, mixed containers, ground cover, and indoor use
• Grows without flowering — not grown for blooms but for foliage architecture
• Critical note: does not tolerate waterlogging — excellent drainage essential

Plant Information

• Upright Height: 5–8 cm
  Trailing Cascade Length: Up to 150 cm
  Spread: 28 cm
  Plant Type: Tender perennial grown as a cool-season annual
  Habit: Trailing, cascading, self-branching — no pinching required
  Foliage: Fresh vivid green — kidney-shaped, slightly cupped leaves
  Flowers: Insignificant, tiny white — plant grown entirely for foliage
  Crop Time (Spring): 12–14 weeks from sowing
  Germination: 6–8 days at 22–24°C

Germination Instructions

• Expect radicle emergence in 6–8 days.
• Cover seeds with a thin layer of vermiculite or substrate to maintain moisture and humidity levels — this is necessary for germination.
• Light is not required.
• Sowing method: 1–2 seeds per plug. Media pH: 5.5–6.3; EC 0.75. Temperature: 22–24°C.
• For irrigation use warm water above 18°C only.
• Keep soil moisture high until radicle emergence, then reduce moisture levels — seedlings grow best under warm and dry conditions.
• For Kuwait: sow indoors in air-conditioned conditions in August–September.
• The warm germination temperature of 22–24°C is easily maintained in Kuwait’s air-conditioned environments.
• Once seedlings are growing actively, move to the brightest available indoor position before outdoor transplanting in October–November.
• The BeGreen ApeX seed treatment significantly reduces the germination challenges that untreated dichondra seed can present.

Growing Tips

• Growing on maintain 17–18°C at night and 18–22°C during the day.
•  No pinching needed — branching of Green Surfer is fantastic and cultivation is feasible without growth regulators.
• Water consistently but allow the top layer to approach dryness between waterings — dichondra does not tolerate waterlogging.
• A drainage system will help excess water run off.
• In Kuwait’s containers and raised beds, excellent drainage is the single most important cultural requirement — use a course, gritty growing medium rather than a dense moisture-retentive compost.
• Fertilize lightly every two to three weeks.
• High light levels after establishment produce the most vivid green color intensity and the most compact, dense cascade.

Gulf Planting Season

• Indoor sowing (air-conditioned, BeGreen ApeX seed): August to mid-September
• Grow on indoors in bright air-conditioned conditions: September to October
• Transplant outdoors to final container or ground cover position: October to November
• Peak display season: November to March
• Extended season: continues into April and beyond due to exceptional heat tolerance
• Note: Green Surfer and Silver Surfer share identical cultural requirements and can be sown, grown on, and transplanted simultaneously.
• Growing both varieties together in the same hanging basket or mixed container creates a two-tone foliage cascade — fresh green and luminous silver — that provides visual interest independent of flowering throughout Kuwait’s cool season.
• Unlike flowering ornamentals whose display is linked to seasonal temperature and day length, Green Surfer’s foliage display is continuous and unconditional — it grows and cascades as long as it is watered and receives adequate light, making it the most reliable, sustained display plant in this catalogue for Kuwait’s variable cool-season conditions.

Garden Uses

• Green Surfer occupies a unique position in Kuwait’s cool-season ornamental range — it is the only purely foliage trailing plant in this catalogue, providing structural cascading texture that serves as the essential complement to flowering ornamentals in mixed containers and hanging baskets.
• Dichondra plays well with others — vigorous but not overwhelming, excellent branching means it works well as ground cover as well as in mixed containers.
• In the classic “thriller, filler, spiller” container design approach, Green Surfer is the definitive spiller — cascading over the container edge with vivid green foliage that frames the flowering plants above it and visually connects the planting to the space around it.
• Planted alongside Tidal Wave Red Velour petunia, the vivid green cascade behind deep red flowers creates maximum color contrast with minimum competition.
• Alongside Freefall XL trailing pansy, the green foliage provides a natural, garden-like complement that makes the mixed basket appear more naturalistic than an all-flowering composition.
• In hanging baskets alongside Solarscape XL Red Glow, the green foliage complements the red flowers rather than adding another color that might create visual confusion.
• Green Surfer planted as ground cover at 30–45 cm spacing across a raised bed creates a dense, fast-establishing vivid green mat that serves both as an ornamental display and as a living mulch that reduces soil moisture loss — particularly valuable in Kuwait’s dry cool-season conditions where maintaining consistent moisture in raised beds is a management challenge.