Hi I have two of these well over 20 years old . While they so sucker I can think of a half dozen other species that are MUCH worse lol Among it's good attributes is that it's very easy to grow almost pest free and reliably flowers since it flowers in Feb requires a warm one . This year was particularly spectacular except i have drifts of spent flowers all over my new stone paths lol All of the clerodendron family tends to be invasive One of my favorites is C. ugandense "blue butterfly bush" flowers almost 10 months of the year. flowers in two shades of blue Again very aggresive growth but IME does not sucker or seed. Does require extensive pruning as it tends to grow out rather than up. Leaves are not particularly interesting but there is a variagated variety if you can find it but makes up for it in being bug free , conatantly in flower gary

Looking for variegated Clerodendrum trichotomum

Carol, i think yours is def a C. speciosissimum. i have taken sev cuttings while in Miami FL past winter and rooted them, but only one survived. it took a long time to root in flooded large perlite (perlite slush actually) with addition of 3% peroxide (1.5tsp per quart) to keep water from going bad. for the first couple of weeks i keep it in just water and do periodic sink dunks of leaves (just soak the the cutting in water for 30min). this helps with keeping leaves turgid until the roots show up. and that took 2 months! so dunking twice a week and 100% humidity in plastic tent helped me to keep 2 leaves to the end (from huge 5), until finally the growth started. it took a very long time. It was in winter, but past winter in Miami was super warm - 80s in feb and hardly ever below 60F at night. and most cleros were in bloom in the ground. so i don't think that it is a factor. i had to recut the rotting bottom twice and the cuttings were bagged in plastic the whole time. finally after 1 mo i noticed root nubs above perlite level, but it took another month for the 1 root to appear and only on 1 cutting. the other two finally rotted. from all the tropicals that i root in FL ev year this took the longest. it is still indoors in NY in my west window and is budding to flower :). but it still has only a few leaves. so not a very strong plant.

Halyna, I've been pretty successful at protecting most of my plants during the winter, but I may dig this one up and bring it in, I don't know. Most times, if I pile leaves around a plant and cover it with a big nursery pot, I can keep it alive, at least, but like you said, it takes a long time for them to come back out, so maybe I'll just take the two extra cuttings I have and grow one to keep inside. Barb, Yes, I do love my free plants! LOL He knows they die back, but usually, they come back up. This one just didn't for some reason. Anyway, I'm sure he'll be happy to get this baby. I love giving plants away as much as I love growing them.