Tropicals & Tender Perennials: Some begonias starting to grow now, 1 by hcmcdole

hcmcdole wrote:
Louise,

A lot of web sites are like that. Either wholesale or just pictures. Always good for reference though. Just wish there was one location (ABS?) that had a fairly complete list along with stunning pictures but the ABS site is very lacking.

Laurie,

The Rob's begonias were bought back in September or October to replace the ones I killed earlier. Another lesson learned - DON'T use garden fertilizer on young small plants. Stick with slow release and/or water soluble. Rob's come in very small pots but very well packed (a bit too much tape though) - about rinse cup size but grow well if you treat them right. 'Chantilly Lace' is one I've had for a few years and has outgrown its present 4 inch pot.

One more lesson I'm slowly learning is don't economize on pots, i.e. using a community pot instead of individual pots. It's a lot cheaper in the long run to lose one plant instead of several in the same pot.

You're right about the aerial roots - it is due to the high humidity in the aquarium. The other thing I didn't mention is that most of those pots also have roots that have come out the drainage hole. Now that's what I like to see - Lots of roots!!!

'Sinbad' is notorious but so are a lot of canes as a powdery mildew magnet. Mine starts getting it in late August/early September and will last through May. It drops all its leaves and the top parts of the canes as well. I just try to keep it from rotting (read - cut the water down tremendously), spray from time to time with Lysol, and wait until spring. I'm sure if I had a huge light source over it then it would do a lot better.

Jackie,

As for the large pots, I think if we had an idea on how big some plants get and how fast they grow, then we could select an appropriate sized pot early in the game. We also should consider moving the pots back inside. They can be heavy and take up a lot of space.

I bought about a dozen large pots last year (18 inch) at Sam's for around $10 a pop and several ended up being used for begonias. 'Caribbean King' and 'C. Queen' quickly filled these pots from gallon size starts. Nelumbifolia filled it well, but the leaves did not get as big as I had expected. 'Plum Gorgeous' did well to begin with but then had a setback (fertilizer?). As for the pots with canes, I typically put 3 or 4 different ones in each pot and they all did very well, although 'Sinbad' dwarfed its pot mates.

Sam's has a different style this year but still very affordable. They also have 22" pots around $15.

You can also force a smaller size as well by limiting the size of the pot. Here is a picture of my 'Black Coffee' in 4 different size pots. The one in the middle clay pot is the parent. The bigger pots and the solo cup were all started by a leaf off the parent at the same time. The solo rinse cup has a bit of soil on the bottom to raise the plant up to the rim. The plant is in a Jiffy peat cube so I have no soil on the sides which keeps the roots "air-pruned".