Variegated Ponytail Palm ''Variegata'' (Beaucarnea recurvata)

Variegated Ponytail Palm ''Variegata''
Beaucarnea recurvata

Beautiful!

nice, but I think you will find this is not recurvata, but guatamalensis

Thanks, Geoff, for the identification. I'll have the picture moved:-)

not yet... still some controversy so hang on a bit

Oh, okay. I was just looking at your variegated B. guatamalensis plant in your journal and also reading about the regular B. guatamalensis in your article on investments in plants. Your yard is so awesome! Your regular B. guatamalensis seems to have a lot of pups whereas my variegated one does not -- at least not yet. As you know, I have mine planted in kind of a small area, and so I will be so disappointed if it outgrows the space. LOL! It will be interesting to see what it looks like in another few years or a decade.

WOW Clare, you yard looks great. You have done so much work! So how does your plant look now?

looks great indeed!

Thanks, Kell and Geoff. It has grown quite a bit since that last picture. I have it planted with a Kentia, a Tasmanian tree fern, and some cycads. It's probably too crowded in that little space, but I'm hoping they will all do okay together.

Here's the same angle as picture on November 8, 2010. The banana was moved and a palm planted in its place, and a few more palms and cycads went into the landscape.

It looks so nice, Clare! I am shocked you do not have it wall to wall with pots of plumeria! What happened? Did you take the cure? Your yard looks so normal as in not like a complete plant nut lives there. LOL

Didn't you have an AeAe? Did it die? I have killed too many at too high a cost to even try again.

Thanks, Kell! LOL! There are about 10 plumerias, mostly dwarves and species, planted in the front there. They are hard to see because most of them are dormant and without leaves. Another 20 or so plumerias are planted along the side, and another 80 or so are planted in back. I look a little nuttier if you see the back. LOL! I probably would have planted it with mostly plumeria if it hadn't been for DH complaining at every turn about too many plumerias. My yard would look totally different if I didn't have a husband!

I do still have an AeAe in the ground, and I have about five mats of variegated Thai bananas. You should try the Thai variegated bananas. They are far less fussy and just as gorgeous and would probably grow great for you in the ground. I've been selling pups here and there just to get back my initial investment. Green Thumb Nursery even said that they would buy some Thai variegated bananas from me this summer. I killed 4 AeAe's at $100 a pop initially. Ouch! The fifth one lived and is in the ground. I didn't lose any of the Thai ones that I bought. You can see pictures of all my variegated banana album here: http://s95.photobucket.com/albums/l153/Clare_CA/bananas/variegated%20bananas/?start=all

Here is the AeAe in the corner. The picture was taken in July, 2011. It is much taller now with taller pups. Unfortunately, the wind shreds the leaves terribly, and we get a lot of wind here. It makes it hard to see the variegation when the leaves are so shredded.

Laughing about "normal" garden. Boohoo my var ponytail died pretty fast and all the var nanas perished too.

Kell, adore Ur yellow petunia pics. Yellow is my preferred color in petunias and amaryllis

So sorry, Nery! I'll let you know if mine ever sprouts pups.

So glad to see you are still one of us Clare!!!! LOL! Husbands can get in the way! LOL. I am so thankful mine does not compete with me for space for his favorite type of plants, which are dead ones.

Hi Nery. Thanks. Remember when yellow petunias first came out, they were so hot! Now there are a few of them. I have not seen a real yellow amaryllis. Is it a real bright yellow? I am trying to picture it. I remember when you bought that variegated pony tail! BOO that it died on you. No fair! I thought they were easy, no? I want one but am too cheap at the moment and I had not even considered it may die on me. With the AeAe I knew it probably would. I may have to reconsider my need for one. I read the variegated ponytail prefers outside for best color.

I am so jealous of your AeAe, Miss Clare. It is painful to think of mine dead. I have never heard of a variegated Thai banana. What is a matt? They sound promising. Maybe if you get a real variegated one for sale I would try try again. Though I do not think I could stand another death. I could be tempted by one like this, so very variegated and with different shades of color. YUM! http://s95.photobucket.com/albums/l153/Clare_CA/bananas/variegated%20bananas/?action=view¤t=060210003.jpg I so like it.

The shape of this one reminds me of an Ensete Maurelii. http://s95.photobucket.com/albums/l153/Clare_CA/bananas/variegated%20bananas/?action=view¤t=071510008.jpg

Hi Guys!

I think they have the variegated Ponytail Palm at Green Thumb Nursery. That is where I got mine. I think it was around $25. I had mine in shade for a little while, and it did fine. I think the pink comes out in full sun though. If mine ever sprouts pups, I would remove them because that area is already too crowded. So I'll let you know if that happens.

Kell, that first picture is the AeAe when it was little. The second picture is the Thai one. The leaves are definitely wider and fuller than the AeAe, especially when young. Older more mature leaves are slightly less variegated and longer and slimmer. The Thai one would not die on you. They are very hardy and vigorous; however, I am unsure of how much cold they can take. I just sold one to a guy in Lake Charles, Lousiana, who plans to put it in the ground, and I think he is Zone 9b. He may give it some overhead protection though maybe by some surrounding taller trees. These are still pretty new so I think, as more people start to grow them, we will know what kind of weather they can take. So far, they have survived two winters at my place. It's the wind that is miserable.

I personally would not mind if mine were killed to the ground by frost as long as new pups come up every spring. I think that they will bear inedible seeded fruit anyway. The young pups tend to be prettier than the mature stalks anyway. A "mat" is a term used for a group of bananas that come from the same corm. The momma sends up pups from her corm. The pups can then be separated from the mat as long as there is sufficient corm taken with it. Roots don't tend to matter too much, but corm is important. I think that my past failures with the AeAe is that the seller sent very little pups with not enough corm. The bananas that I send out are massive, and they always have a big chunk of corm on them.

I do have one that is particularly variegated right now in a five-gallon container. I think it needs some time to develop some more roots since its separation. If you are interested, let me know. You can always come see it in person:-) If you came to see me, we could dig up a massive one for you!

Kell and Nery, I just wanted to add a little note to our discussion, Harvey over at Bananas.org just told me he was able to keep his variegated banana alive through his 9b winter in the ground, and so that is definitely exciting news: http://www.bananas.org/f3/variegated-thai-banana-pups-14591.html and just to keep this on topic, the variegated Ponytail Palm is also supposed to be hardy to Zone 9.

Gee, I want to go to Green Thumb Nursery. Someone mentioned that nursery recently on another thread. Oh Clare, I would so love to come your way. I am dying to go to nurseries your way to buy so blue cactus. LOL. Seems you guys have some great nurseries. I even bought a new car with lots of room for a trip South but then life intervened. LOL

I actually have a spot kind of sheltered for a new banana. I had an Ensete ventricosum there several years ago. WOW that thing got huge and flowered then died. The trunk was massive. My husband was not pleased trying to cut it down and cart it away. I have babies now from its seed that have sprouted and grown to about 4 feet around where it was. I so need to cut them down now but have not had the heart.

So tell me if you cut off all the leaves every so often can you kind of control its size? Is it a bad idea to cut off all its laeves?

Gee Clare, you always are so tempting! LOL

Hi Kell,

I know how it goes when life intervenes. Green Thumb is nice but pricey in general in my opinion. I've gotten a few nice things from them, but I've gotten some better deals at the nurseries in Somis off Highway 118. There are a bunch of wholesale nurseries there that sell to the public also, and they have some neat things there too.

I love the color blue too in plants and recently spent over $600 on blue cycads. Ouch! I have some blue palms that are just gorgeous too.

I have an Ensete too that is pretty large, and I'm not looking forward to it flowering. You could probably sell those Ensete pups to a nearby nursery if you wanted. They would probably even come get them. That does sound like a lot of work to get them out.

Well, the leaves are what make the variegated banana attractive, and so I don't think cutting off its leaves would be a good idea. I doubt it would help to control its size because new ones would come in rapidily. Even if you tried to control its size by keeping it in a restricted container, the corm and roots would just break the container. This is a large banana. Mine are easily 12 feet tall at the top of the pseudo stem. These would be so much better if they were shorter bananas. Then the wind wouldn't shred the leaves so badly. When a dwarf Thai variegated banana comes out, I'll be all over that! LOL!

This message was edited Mar 25, 2012 12:43 PM

Kell, just for you, h. evansiae. But truth be told, I have lemon lime, evansiae, lemon sorbet, lemon star, lemon this, lemon that, seeds from the lovely 9kitty which germinated, became plants and eventually bloomed. They ALL look the same when it comes to yellows. Maybe a slight difference in shape of petals but so minor that it's of no consequence or relevance to their beauty. Back when I was really trying to keep up w/ names, I would have been upset about the fact they look the same, but once puppies took the labels off my plants and threw them wherever they felt like throwing them, I threw my arms in the air, and just enjoy the "yellows".