My Cordyline 'Black Ribbons' providing a pretty backdrop for white amaryllis here. It's really happy once I got up the nerve to lop it. Most of my others are still a little scruffy, but this one was in a pot small enough to be moved, and got to come into the hoop house for the winter cold snaps.

Just got this today, small Ti that has the same apparent 'fan' arrangement of the leaves as Singapore Twist...anyone know the cultivar name? Its a green and white variegate.

Gina1960 said: Just got this today, small Ti that has the same apparent 'fan' arrangement of the leaves as Singapore Twist...anyone know the cultivar name? Its a green and white variegate.

Gina, Have you found the name of that one?

No, never did

Tom Piergrossi has several similar looking ones but it is hard to see the arrangement of he leaves.
https://tom-piergrossi.squares...

It could be the White Diamond.

This is it today

my C. 'Kiwi' bloomed after 2 years since purchase and interesting things happened: 1 blooming stalk produced a new shoot where the flower stalk was; 2nd just shriveled at the base. I tried to root the tip, but it rotted anyway. So i cut to the soil level and within 10 days I had 5 sprouts! They are all growing well.
The 3rd cane that did not bloom also produced 1 offshoot from the base.

That has been my experience also. I notice over the years that if I cut back a tip that had frozen or something more shoots would come up from the base.

That has been my experience also. I notice over the years that if I cut back a tip that had frozen or something more shoots would come up from the base. I wound up with several large bushy plants that way.

Alice, did you take some of your Cordys to NC? You'll have to overwinter them, of course. But i think it's worth it for unusual ones.

I only took some cuttings of my fav Willii's Gold, they seem to be doing OK. There is small piece of Keeley's Golden in a pot with some red oxalis. Keeley's has never thrived for me and I am surprised it is growing here.

I am going through my old boxes of books and look what I found:



I really don't know why I got it; they don't even grow here and are iffy houseplants.

Nice! That looks like one of those plant books that is pretty enough to be a coffee table book that gets a lot of flip-through action.

I have great results bringing Cordyline inside for winter. No more particular than its close cousins, D. marginata & fragrans. Maybe even less than D. marginata, which throws down a steady stream of leaves inside or out. Cordylines are a tidy indoor plant. Not even necessary to put one in a very sunny spot to maintain some color with the winter leaves usually have some fading, depending on placement. That just adds to the interest for me. 2 versions of the same pretty leaves.

For me there is no comparison to the Dracaena; ti is super-susceptible to spider mites when growing inside.

No one here in FL that I know of grows Ti plants as houseplants, nor do they bring them into the house to overwinter. They usually survive the winter fine. House is too dry for Ti.

With great masochistic enthusiasm, I always enjoy these kinds of tales from the almost-tropics so near by, but yet so far.

I do have some advantage in the humidity area with gas heat. It doesn't dry the air like a central system so the only really dry days are those intermittent ones when the lack of humidity outside dries the indoor air too. Those days when I notice static in my hair and on my clothes. One of the worst feelings, can't stand that! The average humidity here all year is pretty high, so those dry days are thankfully rare.

If I had dry air all winter, I might be having a different experience with bringing Ti inside. I can remember having static hair all winter when I lived in OH because I always had central heat that dried the air terribly, but no Ti plants until after I'd moved to AL.

I'm not in FL, don't have a GH, and am in Z8 so bringing them in here is the only way to ensure survival. Most of my grounded Ti plants survive in most spots, and then they grow back 1-2 feet tall until they get frozen again. A winter could come that wipes all of those out so I've had some inside for the past 12 winters. If I want to have any more than 2 feet tall, winter protection is necessary.

I would be surprised if Cordylines are in any danger in Z10. But it did strike me as interesting that a plant that seems bulletproof to me is described as iffy elsewhere, and that bringing one inside would be tried. I don't bring anything that is reliably hardy here inside unless I'm using parts that would otherwise get wasted by winter to propagate to add to the landscape, like Brugmansia, Lantana. purple heart Tradescantia, confederate roses, rhizomatous Begonias, Kalanchoe blossfeldiana - all herbaceous perennials here. Cordyline is not as reliable as those when it comes to not being killed over winter.

Much of California is pretty dry, I think. Until last year, very dry would describe most of California, in fact, since they had such a terrible years-long drought.

Still warm zone designation but very different climate than we have here in the humid SouthEast.

Here's more food for thought, though. Vancouver, BC where I grew up, is also zone 8 and fairly humid due to simply getting a lot of rain most of the year. But again a very different climate than your zone 8 because of the very short days and long nights in winter, and very long days and short nights in summer. They also have very long, cold, dank and grey winters that last from October through April. It just doesn't get that cold, because of the proximity to the Pacific Ocean.

Yet another reason why I don't think the USDA zones really apply very well to home gardens at all. They're meant for farmers.

Yep, otherwise, it would be the USDG. ; )

I agree with that Elaine. I lived in Los Angeles for 7 years in the 80's until 1992 when we moved to Florida. I never really saw any tropical plants there except bromeliads. At least nothing I personally grow as tropical. It was all bougainvillea, ice plants, orange bird of paradise. They did have citrus trees, avocado trees and guava trees. High percentage of succulents. They grew some monster jade trees. I never saw Ti, philodendrons or anthuriums outside (except at Huntington Gardens). They can grow a lot of nice palms and jacaranda trees