Forest Cabbage Tree, Ti Ngahere 'Electric Pink' (Cordyline banksii)

San Leandro, CA(Zone 9b)

This is so cool! I had one I loved for a few years then covered it with frost cloth 1 winter. By the time I remembered it, it had died of thirst. I felt so terrible.

Hayward, CA

They've come way down in price now Kell...try them again. In fact there is even a Cordy- like I posted with the Hercule's that's every bit the equal of Electric Pink and has the advantage of becoming a single trunk tree. This electric pink has C. banksii genetics and always is a lower clumper.
A garden with these plants and those Yellow Phormiums would not be a garden to notice!

This message was edited Jul 23, 2017 7:56 PM

San Leandro, CA(Zone 9b)

Cordyline Cha Cha is a good looker too! http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/401930/

San Leandro, CA(Zone 9b)

BTW, I used to love phormiums but they revert way to often and look messy as they get older. Cordylines with all the new colors are a much better plant.

Hayward, CA

I see that new yellow one holding its color. The local Sonic burger joint planted a long row- 50'? of them. Just as they were heading to close to 4'..the gardeners cut them back to a spiky foot tall. At first they re grew more green then yellow..it took over two years for the real yellow to come back.

San Leandro, CA(Zone 9b)

Did you see years ago when they planted a hundred or more very pink Phormium 'Jester' in a half circle on the hill from the Oakland Coliseum down to the freeway? And a row of them down by the freeway? My joy was so short lived for the drab olive brown leaves started to take over each plant till they had lost all that made them Phormium 'Jester. UGLY! I think they are gone now though they left them for a few years. I think they had a half circle of Crepe Myrtles just above the phormiums that I never saw bloom.

Hayward, CA

The lower leaves on electric pink do that. And those bronze color turning into dead brown last for years. You have to hope they send up suckers that cover the lower of large plants. Those leaves? I once tried to cut them quick with hand hedge shears. I got nowhere. Stripping them off would seem tedious one at a time. I guess hand cutters if very sharp would do the job.Or scissors.
Thats why the plant in San Leandro with the Hercule's Aloe made an impression on me...clean trunk and lower branches.
I spoke a bit to the nice woman who owns the home...she didn't know what it was-lol.
I didn't ask details about who planted it and other nosiness!

San Leandro, CA(Zone 9b)

Still a great looker!

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