Random plant event: Furcraea foetida offset

Happy Pi Day!

I'll admit that today's subject isn't a particularly exciting photo, but it's one of those cases where what it represents is exciting. This plant had been growing in the parent plant's pot for quite a while; I first noticed there was a pup last May.

At some point this winter, I noticed that it didn't seem to be doing so well -- the parent plant and I haven't figured out this whole winter-watering situation yet. I let it go for a long time, then water, but then when I water, a leaf or two will yellow and die. I haven't figured out whether that's because I watered, or if it's because I let it get really dry first. It's usually grown outdoors, so there's not a lot of information out there about how to do it indoors.

Anyway. So at some point I noticed that the pup seemed to be doing poorly, more so than the parent, so I pulled it out and gave it its own pot. I didn't figure the two-leafed pup would survive the winter -- bad time to transplant, it was already stressed -- but it seemed to be needing more water than what it was getting.

The news today is that the offset is growing a third leaf:


It's still tiny, obviously (the pot is 3 inches along the diagonal), and it's not clear that it's ever going to grow huge, healthy leaves like the parent, but at least it's growing, and I can still have hope that it will grow huge, healthy leaves someday. Considering that I was pretty sure I'd killed it by moving it, that's pretty good news.