Tropicals & Tender Perennials: Leave variegation and light levels , 0 by bwilliams

bwilliams wrote:
The variegated plants cannot make Chlorophyll in the white sections of the leaf this usualy slows the plant down a bit and it will burn in direct sun if it is a sun loving plant naturally as a green form then it would most likely need to be in a bright area but full sun would burn it. As for dark leaf plants most all tropical dark leaf plants enjoy and need full to part sun to be dark. In most cases dark leaf plants in shaded areas at times will not turn dark but stay green. I have seen this with Colocasias and bananas.

With most white variegated plants you need to give the plant enough light to be healthy but the variegated sections will burn in to much light so finding a bit of shade could help. Of course here in KY the sun is much different than south Florida. Some other things that come to play is moisture variegated plants tend to but less if they are really kept moist during hot days also epson salt will help thicken the leaves and has also helped to keep variegated plants from burning.

Here is a picture of Canna stuttgart in full KY sun for the summer. I did get some leaf burn but it was not so bad it effected the over all look of the plant. Some variegations like Canna Tropicanna and others can take full sun with out any burn at all usually the whites and some yellows are effect most.