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stush49

Golden Xanadu

To Mike, I didn't forget you. My Xanadu plant just doesn't want to put out any new growth to get new plantlets from. It is growing itself out of the pot. It loves the water this time of year. As soon as it sets, I'll sent you one.
Stush

Comments (20)

  • Stush2049 Pitts. PA, zone 6
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    My green Xanadu grows a lot with many plantlets coming out. I guess that's why it is cheaper than the Golden one.
    Stush

  • Enterotoxigenic00
    10 years ago

    Stush, of course your plants are beautiful...as usual.
    I love posted pics. At times makes me a bit jealous and other times longing for childhood. When a child we lived "down below" in Los Angeles.
    Fig, Xanadu, elephant ear, and jades grew wild, So large in fact that all the kids in the neighborhood played hide and seek in the bushes in our yard. I'm guessing it was due to the incredible weather. Up here in the desert we drool over these plants, lucky if we can get them to grow. I guess it's a good thing that we have a little house or else I'd be tempted to kill one of these beauties.
    I have not forgotten what I owe, all are happy and healthy.
    K

  • Stush2049 Pitts. PA, zone 6
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    K,
    What I love about Xanadu is that it looks a lot like it's larger cousins but stays a small nice house plant size. I don't think they get much taller than 12 ins. or can easily be kept that size.
    Stush

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    you mean 12" stem? the stem will continue to get higher. i saw pics at 2 feet! like a tree.
    but the leaf stems should get 12"-18" long. so at maturity it could be 3' across - not that small. but that's green, dunnow about golden.

  • Stush2049 Pitts. PA, zone 6
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    Befor mine gets that big, the cutters will come out. How many years do you think it will take? Mine is in pots and limited waterings in the winter months.
    Stush

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    you mean, how long for the trunk? i think if it's growing well - it could get 6-8" a year? in good lighting and feed indoors , in the pot. outdoors in the ground i think it can produce 12" on trunk per year! they are very robust growers. and normally very bushy too - like multiple crowns developing at the base, which eventually will result in multi-trunks.
    yours is just a single (talking about green) - kinda unusual.
    AND your leaf stems are sort of very short. xanadu usually has longer stems and the leaflet is narrower. on your green one - they are almost round, they are normally the shape your golden has. so are you sure-sure it's xanadu?
    it could be a biggie :) ....

  • asleep_in_the_garden
    10 years ago

    The multiple crowns you describe can be snapped off and rooted.
    My hunch is that it would be the same with the golden...can't imagine why not?

    Here's a cutting I took after a week of sitting in a terrarium. I've since dug it out and potted it up and moved it to a different terrarium.

  • birdsnblooms
    10 years ago

    Stush, first, your Xanadus are beautiful, especially the golden.

    I had Xanadu about ten years then gave it away. Over time, it grew 18-20" tall, but very large in width.

    Never did mine pup, or not that I noticed. Instead it grew compact and too wide, 'reason I gave it away.'

    Or maybe I didn't notice pups...but I honestly cannot recall outside growth.

    Toni

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    I wouldn't describe them as pups - it's more like rhizome clusters, with bunches of stems coming from each 'crown'.
    stush, yours must be a year or two old with such trunk.
    I have notes that in sev years it can make about 32" trunk.
    it's a hungry feeder and grows best when it's like 80F , hi humidity, very bright dappled light outside. but indoors and in low light, no feed it won't get far. it needs iron - it gets chlorosis when it does not get enough. which could be kinda difficult to notice on golden one!
    I happened to get a reg one just a month ago - and I had to remove at least half of the leaves, since I suspected bacterial infection. I had them before too, but then I did not know what they prefer.
    so this is a pic of a baby xanadu, top shot: crown clusters (this is pretty normal, most older have even more, denser),
    bottom - gen view of plant in 8" pot/6"hi.
    but I suppose if you cut off just one cluster and grow it by itself it would look like yours?

  • birdsnblooms
    10 years ago

    Pet, you cut half the leaves off the Xanadu posted?
    How large was it before? Looks big now.

    It too is a beauty.

    I'd like a variegated, but they're hard to find, and expensive.

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    yep, this is AFTER i cut off half the leaves. if you look at images of xanadu they all look very dense, and leaves are on very long stems.
    it's growing 2nd leaves from each crown already (dozen new in close to 2 mo+ almost bare-root repot) - so it's quite robust.
    stush's green looks quite different. i am just wondering if it's really a xanadu.
    stush, i saw your pic of both green and gold xanadu here:
    http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/houseplt/msg051858035581.html
    and that pic does look like xanadu. is it the same plant?

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    here's good pics of parents/xanadu - these are wholesalers in fl
    http://www.morningdewtropical.com/gallery.php?cid=50&b=64&l=p
    now you can see how dense they get outside/when sold.
    indoors they fan out bouquet style and elongate due to not enough light. which is still very pretty, but will get to 2'-3'.

  • birdsnblooms
    10 years ago

    Morning,

    Pet, I'd like to see a before photo. Have one?
    I looked at the link you posted..What did you want us to see?
    You didn't post.....

    I also checked out Morningdewtropical. Beautifull Philos. I'd like Pink Princess.

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    i did not take a before pic. just imagine more leaves :).
    in a couple of months it should be just as in the beginning.
    on the link you can see pics of selloum and bipinnatifudum (those are supposedly parents) AND xanadu all on one page (gallery with many pics, scroll down and click to enlarge) - to see the diff in size/growth,etc. see how dense young sold xanadus are when grown in optimal conditions (multiple crowns).
    it seems to me that on stush's photo of green xanadu older leaves are growing larger and are round - sort of reverting to selloum? not that big, of course, but still. normally xanadu leaves remain elongated and narrow.

    This post was edited by petrushka on Wed, Sep 11, 13 at 11:15

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    i looked a bit in aroid forum: this post is interesting
    http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/aroid/msg0617454418598.html
    xanadu vs young bipinnatifidum differences.
    stush, have a look!

  • birdsnblooms
    10 years ago

    Guess if I think about it, I can envision a larger/wider plant.
    But, in my mind, it's huge. :)

    Honestly, with plants like Selloum, Xanadu and few other split-leaf type Philos and Monsteras, I can't tell the difference..Especially youngins.

    I'm going to Google mature Xanadu's and Selloums. See what they look like as adults.

    Yep, I agree. When plants are shipped from Fl to big-box stores, they're absolutely gorgeous..healthy as can be.
    Give stores like HD to destroy their beauty.

    Even though tropicals and sub-tropicals are in their green house.

    I can't speak for warmer states, though.

    When we were in GA, we stopped at a HD. Plants in their gh were doing fantastic.
    IL, big-box stores differ....

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    I dug out some interesting info from specialists on tropicsphere forum (which is no more). here's quote
    P. xanadu is NOT a "compact sport" of "Selloum" ..but a "good" species, quite different to P. bipinnatifidium A.K.A. Philo. ''selloum''. Our 2002 paper..goes into detail on how/where it was brought into cultivation. The treatment of this plant during the tissue culture process causes it to diverge from what it should really look like-- again, read the 2008 paper.
    P. "Hope" and P. "Showboat" are identical to P. xanadu, but have had less exposure to chemicals or NO/little chemicals during their tissue culture production, and they certainly are NOT ''smaller cultivars'' of P. bipinnatifidium. P. "Hope" actually closely resembles what I believe the wild-collected plant of P. xanadu looks like.
    if you want to read it yourself it's here (goto page 2):
    http://www.tropicsphere.com/main/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=8826
    apparently they treat culture with clumping and dwarfing chemicals - that's why nursery xanadu's are so 'clumpy'.
    grown naturally they form single trunks and do not clump (? or clump less? not sure here).
    so does it mean that stush's plant won't clump?
    there's also some obscure ref to superthrive:
    apparently when you chop off the top (with aerial roots) and leave the trunk - often it will die off. but not if you give it some fish emulsion and 'a proper dosage'(whatever that means?) of superthrive. then it will sprout new crown.
    very interesting.

    This post was edited by petrushka on Wed, Sep 11, 13 at 15:12

  • Stush2049 Pitts. PA, zone 6
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    Petrushka,
    Sorry, I been off this forum for awhile. And Yes they are the same plant I pictured befor. I had 'Hope' and it grew way too big and gave to Mike because he liked the hugh big kind. I told him I had a smaller cousin and sent it to him. Xanadu was suppose to be the smallest. So I purchased one from GlasshouseWorks. They sent me 'Golden Xanadu' as a free gift and it was not for sale that year. Next year it was offered and for much more money. The green one does offset and I have given some away here to others. The Gold I promised also to Mike but it has yet to offset or 'pup' any thing out. I though of cutting the top off and rerooting it. But the though of the bottom dying? Well I just want to remind Mike that I didn't forget him.
    Also they loose most of their leaves during winter months due to my poor handling of them. Come spring they produce new and make up for the damage.
    Stush

  • petrushka (7b)
    10 years ago

    oh, wow! loosing leaves? you must keep them cooler? and dryer?
    i kinda hope to keep the leaves going, since i have a couple of hours of sun and the room gets quite toasty, thought the temp drops at night to 65F. but mine is strictly indoors.
    i guess, yours goes outside for summer?
    they look very pretty together on the pic.
    may be if you give it superthrive in spring it'll help it pup?

  • Stush2049 Pitts. PA, zone 6
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    petrushka,
    From what I have read, not so sure I want them. I can't keep plants that big in my house during winter. By keeping them drier and in a colder section of the house, they seem to go to sleep and respond come spring. So far they are staying a small size. You should see what it does to my agaves. Good thing the plant police don't find out about me.

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