Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Giving New Life To Dracenas

You've seen the life and death struggle before: a plant going towards the light. Whether in an dimly lit office or in the corner of a friend's house during the winter, a five to six foot tall dracena marginata bent over and twisted towards a sunny window.


Its easy to rejuvenate your worn out dracena and get it to thrive for another year? Give it a haircut and recondition the soil.  Take your houseplant outside where you can take the entire plant out of the pot.  Be careful if it has a spindly stem to not break it.  (Now it won't kill it if you break it but it's just going to stress you out) Take sharp pruners and cut the stems about  8" to 12" up from the base of the plant.  The cut top portion of the plant can be cut in a foot long pieces, dabbing root toner on the ends and placing in potting soil and kept shaded and moist for several weeks until rooted.  Cut a third of the bottom portion of the plant roots and break up any root mass.  Place new potting soil in your designer pot and replant the topless dracena.  Place in a sunny location and water well.  Its a good time to give it some slow release fertilizer. 

Within a few weeks your dracena will have a new leaves sprouting and will vigorously grow through the summer.  If you're placing it by a window, make sure you turn it once a week, so that all sides have a chance at the sunlight.



No comments:

Post a Comment