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propagation

Gardening with Variegated Plants: Pros and Cons

April 30, 2020

Do you love trying new plants to add a little extra “zing” to your garden? If so, you’ve probably bought or lusted after a plant or two with variegated leaves or flowers. Variegation means that leaves have white, yellow, or other colors in addition to green, or flowers that have multiple colors rather than solid color petals. The variations may be regular bands, edges, patterns, or wild splotches. Although you can find annuals, houseplants, perennials, shrubs, trees, and even herb and vegetable plants with variegation, they are the exception, not the rule. Growing these unusual plants comes with both risks and benefits!

What causes variegation?
Variegation occurs for many reasons.
• It comes naturally. Where variegation has evolved over generations of plants, the plants’ seeds produce new plants with the same characteristics. This pattern variegation may occur in flowers or leaves.

Dragon’s Eye Pine (Pinus densiflora ‘Oculus-Draconis’) with variegated needles (leaves)

• It spontaneously occurs as a “sport” or chimera. Plant can spontaneously produce sections that have cells with two distinct genetic characteristics through mutations. You may spot a branch on a plant you are growing that looks different from the rest of a plant: while most leaves are solid green, one section has white patterns. In this case, if growers want to propagate new plants with this variegation, they must do so vegetatively—from a portion of the parent plant—rather than from seed. The houseplant golden pothos (Epipremnum pinnatum) is easily propagated from cuttings. ‘Night Sky’ petunias are propagated through tissue culture to produce plants that have purple flowers with white splotches—but these patterns vary with temperature (see “For more info below”).

Golden Pothos

 

‘Night Sky’ Petunia

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• It is a symptom of a viral disease. Many variegated plants produce their color variations because of viruses. The most famous example is early generations of tulips that displayed color breaks when infected with tulip breaking virus—as you might expect these tulips eventually declined and contemporary tulips with these distinctive markings are genetic variations, rather than diseased bulbs. Similarly, many variegated Hosta varieties were found to be the result of Hosta virus X and their introduction led to an HVX epidemic and subsequent virus testing of new varieties to try to contain its spread. However, some Camellia varieties with multicolored flowers are plants bred with Camellia yellow mottle virus, and some brightly colored Canna varieties are selections of plants with Canna yellow mottle virus.

Camellia

 

 

 

 

 

‘Bengal Tiger’ Canna

Pros of variegation
The primary advantage of variegation to gardeners is the plant’s distinctive appearance. These plants can serve as important focal points in your landscape design.

Lavender

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Variegated Solomon’s seal (Polygonatum odoratum var. pluriflorum ‘Variegatum’)

From the plants’ perspective, variegation may protect plants from herbivores in a variety of ways (Lev-Yadun, 2015). Other researchers are investigating if white patches on variegated plants might facilitate photosynthesis (the process plants use to process sunlight into glucose) when temperatures are low, helping them survive lower temperatures than solid green plants.

Cons of variegation
Some people just don’t like variegated plants and gardeners certainly risk having garish landscapes if they overuse them! Linda Chalker-Scott, Extension Urban Horticulturist, describes variegated plants as “tarted-up” and notes they often looking “environmentally stressed and/or diseased.”
• Weaker growth/Failure to thrive. In fact, some variegated plants don’t do as well as their unvariegated counterparts. Because variegated leaf sections don’t have the chlorophyll of green sections, photosynthesis is typically less efficient, and many variegated plants show weaker growth. Similarly, variegated plants that carry viruses may decline because of the viral infection or even pass the disease on to related plants in your landscape.
• Reversion. Another problem is variegated plants that are “sports” or chimeras may revert to solid green—if you see such new growth, remove it immediately!
• Propagation issues. Unless you know the source of variegation in your plants, you may have difficulty producing more plants—especially from seed. Also, many variegated plants are patented and cannot be propagated for resale without permission.

Article by Buncombe County Extension Master Gardener Volunteers

For more information:

Variegation:https://irrecenvhort.ifas.ufl.edu/plant-prop-glossary/03-genetic-selection/22-genetic-variegation.html

Lev-Yadun, Simcha (2015). The Proposed Anti-Herbivory Roles of White Leaf Variegation. In U. Lu ̈ttge, W. Beyschlag (eds.), Progress in Botany, Springer International.https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Simcha_Lev-Yadun/publication/300009810_The_Proposed_Anti-herbivory_Roles_of_White_Leaf_Variegation/links/592b28ad0f7e9b9979a95996/The-Proposed-Anti-herbivory-Roles-of-White-Leaf-Variegation.pdf

Viruses and ornamental plants:https://apsjournals.apsnet.org/doi/pdf/10.1094/PDIS-11-11-0928-FE

Night sky petunias:https://www.zmescience.com/science/night-sky-petunias-03042019/

Linda Chalker-Scott:http://gardenprofessors.com/tricky-tricolor-leaf/

Why plants lose their variegation:http://gardenprofessors.com/why-doesnt-my-plant-look-like-it-did-last-year/

 

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Categories General Gardening, Landscaping Tags cultivar, flowers, landscape planning, propagation, Variegated plants

Time to Repot Houseplants? Beware the Potting Soil!

March 31, 2020

If you are sheltering in place, maybe you’ve had a chance to take a good look at your houseplants! If your plants are looking happy, you’re probably providing the right amount of light, humidity, and fertilizer—if they’re not, consider doing a bit of research on the plants you’re growing to see if you have optimum growing conditions, using the sources in the “Choosing and caring for indoor plants” in the “For more information” section. If your plants are growing well, you may need to repot them to keep them thriving.

Rootbound plant

Are your plants rootbound? This is a good time to repot rootbound plants. Carefully tip your plants out of their pots—if roots are filling the pot and circling the bottom, it may be time to repot.

Does your plant need dividing or restarting?
You can—or even should—divide some plants rather than simply repot. African violets, for example, may develop multiple crowns and dividing will restore their symmetrical beauty! You may want to divide other houseplants just to share!

Dividing African violet crowns

If your plant has become not only too big for its pot, but too big for your home, consider propagating a new, smaller version to keep, and give the parent plant away. You can also do this to start over if your plant is simply unattractive because it hasn’t had the best of care. See propagation resources in the “For more information” section.

Container size?
This is also the time to make sure your plants are in the right size containers—plants bursting out of their pots may need a larger home, but if there are already more than a couple of inches of bare soil between the plant growth and the pot edge, you may have “overpotted” your plant and need to downsize! Again, the type of plant will determine if you need a new container. When choosing a new pot for a plant, also consider the depth of the pot. Some plants will appreciate deeper pots, while others will do fine in a shallow pot.

Potting soil
Not all potting soils are alike! Jim Downer of the University of California Cooperative Extension notes in a recent article http://gardenprofessors.com/potting-soil-poison/ that many planting medium ingredients may actually be hurting your plants! He explains how carefully reading the ingredient list can help you decide on a mix and when or if you will need to fertilize your plants.

Read the ingredients before buying potting soil

If you have potting soil on hand, check the ingredients. If you need to buy a new mix, do your homework ahead of time, especially if you’ll be pre-ordering and driving by to pick it up rather than having a chance to look at the bag before buying.

Repotting
Once you have a container and a medium:
• If you are using a clay pot, soak it first so the pot will not draw moisture from the potting soil.
• Analyze your plant’s roots—use your fingers to loosen densely matted or circling roots and remove any dead or damaged areas.
• If you wish, cover any hole (or holes) in the bottom of the pot with a piece of broken pottery or a piece of a coffee filter to prevent soil from leaking out. DO NOT put any “drainage” material, such as gravel, in the bottom of the pot—gravel can actually impede soil drainage!
• Place enough potting soil in the bottom of the pot so that your plant roots will have new room to grow.
• Set the plant in the pot and fill in around the sides and surface with new planting medium, tamping lightly and making sure you DO NOT build up new soil around the plant stems.
• Thoroughly water the newly potted plants.
• Do not leave plants in standing water.
• If your potting mix doesn’t contain fertilizer, plan to use a houseplant fertilizer and fertilize at the strength and frequency recommended on the label—too much fertilizer can impede growth, cause dried/burned leaf margins, loss of leaves, brown roots, or even kill your plant!

                                 Article by Buncombe County Extension Master Gardener Volunteers

For more information:
Choosing and caring for indoor plants:
https://extension.uga.edu/publications/detail.html?number=B1318&title=Growing%20Indoor%20Plants%20with%20Success

https://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/Portals/0/Gardening/Gardening%20Help/Factsheets/Indoor%20Plants21.pdf

https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/topics/selecting-houseplants

Propagating new plants:
https://extension2.missouri.edu/g6560

https://content.ces.ncsu.edu/extension-gardener-handbook/13-propagation

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Categories Houseplants Tags houseplants, potting soil, propagation, repotting houseplants

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