Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Random plant event: Billbergia nutans offsetting

I've had this plant for about nine months now. It's been well-behaved. (Maybe a little quiet.) I received two unrooted plants, one of which had a developing offset on it; the offset developed, but one of the original two plants looks like it's thinking about dying (I'm not sure. A couple of the leaves in the center of the rosette died; those on the outside are still fine.), so up until now it's been a wash. But now, there's a new offset! A net gain!


Flowers would be nice too, but I have no idea if that's a realistic prospect at this point. Google says they're spring bloomers, so I suppose we'll have an answer by summer.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

My plant bloomed in December, though I suspect it's a hybrid with B. nutans parentage rather than the species.

This seems to me to be one of the great little-known-but-easy houseplants. I hope eventually you'll decide it merits a profile.

Don

m3rma1d said...

Congrats on the baby! I googled, wow those are some interesting flowers! Hope we get to see yours bloom in the spring.

The Phytophactor said...

The window of opportunity for this bromelliad flowering may have passed; they seem to flower midwinter, although mine summer outside and that may help set their clocks. Each whorl will only flower once, and after flowering that branch dies, and as you have noticed new branches continue the growth. You may have to wait a year.