I have a plant question. 1,In one of the pictures att, is Taro Plant/Elephant Ears.Question, can they be rooted by cutting one stem and put in water to root, or am I going to have to dig up one whole plant. Also, another question, 2. , In the other picture-what kind of plant is this? Elephant-Taro Root picture has the heart shaped leafs, the other picture the leafs are narrow. Thanks so much.

Hi Laura, to NGA

#1 Taro, Imo... There is a bulb down there. Leaves won't root but you can lift the bulbs and move them. Or go to the Aisian market and buy more (That's how I got my first Imo).

Daisy

You have lots of little plants already in that clump of Elephant Ears, Laura. By the end of summer, each of those plants will be a lot bigger if you water and fertilize them, and they will probably make "pups" or offsets that you can separate from the mama plant to start new ones. If you want some to bring in for the winter, so you can start them again next spring, you can bring in the little pups, and either grow them as indoor plants or let them gradually dry out, keep them cool and plant again next spring. You might even keep some of the original plants alive through the winter with a deep layer of mulch - wood chips or dead leaves, piled on top of the plants once the tops die back.

Not sure what the other plant is, but it will be a lot easier to ID if you'll wait a couple of weeks and post it again when it is in bloom.

Looks like the running kind... You are likely to be weeding the taro out far more than the Erechtites... which gets large fast, but is mostly harmless.

I often wait for the american burnweed to bulk up before pulling it and adding it to the compost...

I googled the edibility of Colocasia... apparently you can eat the ones that you pull...
https://permies.com/t/20858/pl...

I once made a mistake of gifting someone with the running taro, and it tried to eat the entire garden... Took quite a bit of work to clean that stuff out... it still springs up... years later...