We have a pair of plumeria that we got 3 or 4 years ago as young but established plants (they were in medium pots, about 3' tall and had branched once or twice when we got them).
They've been growing slowly, which I think is normal, since then and we put them in large terra cotta pots with potting soil and they've seemed reasonably happy. Living in Southern California we don't ever really freeze here, but it does get below 40 in the winters, so we'll bring them into the garage for the coldest months and put them back out when temperatures start to warm up. While wintering them we only water them perhaps once in the 2 or 3 months that they're indoors.
This winter one of them started getting shriveled and squishy in the middle which concerned me, but I was hoping it was just a part of hibernation. I brought them back outside last week and gave them some water, but that one has not recovered. After looking around online I tried pricking it with a pin in various places. The tips (which are still green and firm) bleed white sap freely, as does the base almost up to the first branching, but most of the space in between does not.
From what I've read this means the middle sections have almost certainly rotted and need to be cut away -- one of the tips is about 6 inches long and *may* be large enough to root from a cutting, but I'm more interested in the base -- it's already established and doesn't seem to have rotted all the way down. If I cut the whole plant off at that point will it survive?
This picture is the whole plant:
Here's a closer picture of one of the soft sections; the parts that show up yellow under the flash are more of a sickly brown under natural light:
And finally a photo of the base -- it still bleeds when pricked up to just below the fork there. The brown streak coming up from the dirt does not feel soft but also doesn't bleed unless I prick it fairly deeply -- it may just be beginning to form its thicker, more mature bark?
Thanks for any advice you can give me!
