Draceana marginata growth rate

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kwie2011 Cottage Grove, OR Aug 30, 2014

Anyone really familiar with Draceanas? How fast does D. marginata grow in ideal conditions? What are ideal conditions?

It's been ages since I've had one, but mine have always grown very straight and very slowly. I see these tall ones in office buildings and malls, with their wonderfully twisting stems and branches, each terminating in a clump of graceful leaves, and I'm reminded of Dr. Seuss trees. I think they're beautiful, but judging from my own experience with D. marginata, those plants would have to be 15 or 20 years-old to reach that size - and I don't know how they get their curves. How do I get one to grow like that?

How can I get the fastest growth? How do I get it to curve and branch?

Please tell me how to make them grow!

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Baja_Costero Baja California, Mexico(Zone 11) Aug 30, 2014

To get the plant to branch, chop off the top (which you can root separately if you like). If you do this repeatedly over the course of a few years, you will have a well branched specimen down the road. I can't speak for ideal conditions but the plant should grow a few inches a year with good light and occasional feeding.

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hcmcdole Powder Springs, GA(Zone 7b) Aug 30, 2014

I would think ideal conditions would be some place tropical where the citizens grow it as a hedge or it is growing in the wild. If you can imitate that...

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kwie2011 Cottage Grove, OR Aug 30, 2014

Baja - have you actually done that to your own D. marginata? I haven't seen evidence of that treatment in the big ones I see (not like the so-called "corn plants" that almost always bear the scars of being beheaded). I've looped off plenty of plants, but not when doing so leaves just a leafless stem. Call me chicken, but it seems risky.

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Baja_Costero Baja California, Mexico(Zone 11) Aug 30, 2014

There are lots of Dracaenas and I'm only familiar with a couple of them. But yes, you really do chop off the head. I bought my wife one that had been taken care of the way I describe (not by me) and the evidence is still there: you can see the cut stems, stumps essentially, at every point where the branches emerge, 3 or 4 at a time. But because the branches shoot up and out from there, and the foliage is more abundant, the scars are pretty well hidden. Especially over time.

Definitely don't cut your plant if you aren't prepared to accept failure, but honestly I think it's pretty hard to kill them. That's one reason why they tend to be cheap and abundant. It should be very easy to root the cutting regardless, so the risk is really minimal (by my standards anyway).

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