Mid-Atlantic Gardening: Indoor gardening, Mid atlantic, 2015, 5 by Gitagal

Gitagal wrote:
jeff--

I would leave it be--no sense trying to push it into growth when it wants to be
semi-dormant. Please stop it for now.

Come late spring--put it outside in semi-shade and give it a shot of something.
It will grow nice and bushy and bloom in late summer/early fall. depends on
what it wants to do. It does NOT like to be in full sun!

Blooms will come on all the growing ends--just not all at once.
When the bloom fades, gently break it off the tip of the stem. You may get a 2nd bloom
on the same stem tip--or it may have grown a side shoot to bloom again.

You do not have to cut it back while it is so small. it will bush out nicely the 2nd (3rd?) year.
De "Plume" is a woody plant and can break if it falls down. A sheltered spot is OK.
That is how I found out that the broken off tops WILL root. My Plume got blown over in
high winds and every stem broke off. ALL of them! OMG! What to do....what to do....

So--I stuck all the stem tips back into the pot, around the edge, to see what would happen.
By next spring--they were all rooted. AHA!!! Live and learn!!!

At this time, the mama I cut back last fall, has grown somewhat. I never feed it--just water.
It is sitting, by a curtained window, on the end of one of the twin beds in my guest BR.
It gets some light in the afternoon. It has grown a bit....will take a pic.

Besides the "PLUME" there are also asst. Begonias, including my 2 big "Beef Steaks"
on the end of, and by this bed and, on a separate table nearby, is my monster AW Begonia
I bring in every winter. It will drop all its leaves from the long stems (not the growing tips)
and exist--waiting for spring. It is SO tall and lanky--but that is how it is--every year.

Approaching late spring--I will take it out, cut all thew stems back to nubs (saving the top
growths--discarding the caanes ) and root them to share as new plants.
Then--I will completely uproot it--remove all the older roots to toss--and save the fresher
roots to re-pot after I get rid of all the old soil and start with fresh, adding some Osmacote
to feed it through out the summer. This is an annual routine for me.
It will sit on my front door landing in bright shade until October. No sun! Fed now and then.

It is seldom it blooms for me--as I am always cutting the tips off--where the blooms would form--
but it blew me away last summer! It bloomed so beautifully. I never got to re-pot it last year.
Maybe that was the 'secret"? This year--OH, yeah! Back to the ole routine.

And-BTW-I have had this same AW Begonia for over 20 years as well.
Just keep propagating it through cuttings and root-pruning. Don't even remember where,
or when, I got it. Same as my Amaryllis and my old CC's.

SO--Here are some pictures from today: Jan. 19, 2015.

1--De "Plume" on de bed growing some new leaves
I cut it back pretty severely. Nothing green left--except ONE new stem-shoot.

2--De old AW Begonia hanging in for the winter

3--Behind de Plume and de AWB--live my 2 Beef Steak begonias.
Must say--they are doing pretty well all things considered..

4--Last year in August--the AWB ahowing off...

5--Also last year in August--De Plume in bloom.