Every now and then a seasoned gardener comes across a plant she’s never seen before, and it astounds and delights her.
No matter how experienced she is, she’s never seen anything like the Royal Peacock Feather Hosta!
The Peacock Flame Hosta is colorful and splashy. Around its base fan out bicolored leaves that look more like coleus than hosta, about three or four levels high. From there sprouts an abundance of stalks of and, more notably, 13 or 14 peacock feathers.
The Peacock Flame Hosta plant comes in colors straight from the 1980s: eerily electric looking blue, or yellow, or green, or orange, or pink, or purple, or white.
Spireshells.com advertises “Peacock Flame Hosta Corms – Stunning Colors that Brighten Any Space.” The price is shown in grey as $79.99, and that is crossed out with “$39.99” in green beside it. “Hurry! Only 250 left in stock,” the website warns us. “98% customer buy 3-5 items to use daily and gifts for their beloved one.”
The website says that “2505 People are viewing right now,” and that number increases by the moment. A countdown tells us the sale is ending in 9:19 — 9:18 — 9:17 …
The website has a handful of reviews, such as from this happy husband: “I transplanted this Peacock Hosta into my patio pot a few weeks back. My wife’s out here watering it right now, and I just love this quiet little moment. I adore this plant, but I love my wife even more,” with a heart emoji. There’s even a picture of a woman on a dingy back patio using a hose which ends in a watering can to water a garish purple plant with purple and blue leaves.
The hostas which grow in my yard have root clumps, but this website talks about them growing from corms and yet a video on the website shows a bulb being planted, watered and growing quickly into a blue plant.
Perhaps most surprisingly, the Peacock Hosta continues with its leaves and blooming colorfully and profusely even in the snow.
The bottom of the website has that official-looking panel most have, with links such as “Track My Order,” “Shipping Policy,” “Return & Refund Policy,” “Cancellation/Order Change,” “About Us,” “FAQs,” “Payment Methods,” “Terms of Service” and “Privacy Policy,” but . Tapping on them does not do anything.
The address shows in Singapore.
But the Facebook page “Growviaseeds” takes the Royal Peacock Feather Hosta to a whole new level. Not only does this Hosta grow peacock feathers out the top, but it also grows a peacock body! Its stately breast, neck and face rise above the plant regally, its resplendent tail feathers proudly displayed around it.
There’s one on Facebook called GreenySeeds. It sells seeds it claims are of “Rare Midnight Purple Hosta.”
“Plant it this November and let this hardy, magical hosta take over your garden. As Christmas approaches, its deep purple glow becomes a natural holiday decoration. A rare black and purple hosta that looks like it came from another planet.”
Well, no kidding. It certainly does not come from Planet Earth.
Though the first parts of the video show it being planted and growing in snow, the next scene of the video says, “It grows in heat up to 115 degrees Fahrenheit.”
One of the best scenes of the video show a man lovingly placing his Midnight Purple Hosta on the counter, underneath the water spigot. The sink basin is to the right of the spigot, and there are no handles to turn water on or off.
I wanted to click onto the website to see more to be able to make even more fun of it, but my computer’s security program lit up: “This website has been blocked. www.greenyseeds.com could be a fake e-store. Hackers create fake online stores like a real store, so they can try to steal your personal info or money.”
It would be obvious to most people that all these videos are created by AI. These websites are selling something that doesn’t exist.
There is indeed a Hosta called Hosta ‘Peacock Feathers.’ However, it looks nothing like feathers nor like a peacock. It’s just a Hosta with pretty green leaves, rounded at the top and pointed at the end.
While all of this might be obviously fake to most of us, many people fall for it. The comment section of the “peacock flame hosta” has a combination of people warning that this is a scam, people admiring the beauty of the plant and several saying they ordered from there and the seeds just grew weeds.
Maybe most of us don’t need to be afraid of falling for a scam now, with the Peacock Flame Hosta ads being so ridiculous and obvious. However, AI is getting better and better fast, at the same time that businesses are doing as much as they can to get rid of their customers in person and just make all interactions online.
Though it’s obvious to us today what’s real and what’s fake, we’re moving quickly to a time when we won’t know.
CAPTIONS:
1: Screenshots of websites promoting nonexistent hostas show how AI-generated images are being used to market fake plants online.
