Ensete Maurelli, storing in compost vs drying out?

[sanatic1234]

would you not be best watering in the morning with it cooling down at night? Just a thought. All my plants indoors but one has stopped growing now.

[kata]

Looks like a head start already San

[cordyman]

Will wait till the morn, good call

[Dave Brown]

i'm going to add a trickle of water to mine tonight, keep them active

Good luck, as you'll need it, unless the temps are high enough for it to use up the water very quickly.

[sanatic1234]

Looks like a head start already San

It won't look as healthy as that kata come mid spring time when it gets its first drink of the season. be pretty dry then as its only running on the moisture whats left inside the plant and what is left in the soil once that is gone that is it. It goes thirsty for 3 months lol....

[kata]

Awe, that three months seems light years away..

91 days: 13 hours: two minutes: to the first day of Spring.

Roll on San.

[sanatic1234]

AGREED! but the way things are going now it will be here before you know it. xmas next week already! it is going extremely fast.

[derrick]

Got mine dry root not given them any water .Once they grow new roots I will water them .Mine not moving much and very dry now.

[doncasterpalmguy123]

So which of the two methods would any of you say is the most successful? Im going to grow some next year and would like to know which is the best method?

[Kristen]

So which of the two methods would any of you say is the most successful?

My 2p-worth:

If they are small they need growing-on over the winter, e.g if you have supplemental light. If not leave in pots but provide as little water as possible. When small I think they are unlikely to survive being dry-stored, or will be significantly set back.

Thereafter if you have space, and HEIGHT!!, in your greenhouse/conservatory you can consider storing in pots. I have grown them in pots, plunged the pots into the border, and lifted them, in their pots, for the winter. I barely water them.

If you don't have space them dry store them. Getting them dry is critical, and folk do seem to lose some (so it is not entirely straightforward, but people who have been doing it for years don't lose many/any? so it can obviously be done).

Having said that, people have losses storing the IN pots too - too much water I suspect, which then leads to root rot.

I'm no expert though.

[doncasterpalmguy123]

Ok thanks for your help.

[GREVILLE]

Slightly sticky problem for my medium-sized maurellii. Before bringing inside in the Autumn some high winds made the plant lean badly, tearing the roots and making it very unstable in the tub. Instead of taking it to my local school to keep it active, I kept it in the frost free greenhouse, where, after cutting off some lower leaves, an opening roller indicated some form of recovery. Not much re-rooting has taken place to stabilise it.

I took it back to the school today to leave it in a warm place (heating on over the holiday) with plenty of water in a reservoir to keep it happy for just over two weeks. The school is locked up till the new term. Hoping it will make more roots before the kids return Wonder if I've done the right thing

[Dave Brown]

mmmm..... difficult one Greville

lack of light will be a problem, and without much light there won't be much growth, so only evaporation will use water.

[cordyman]

update, gave them a thimble worth of water to keep them going, and they have heat from the room everynight, and light from the south facing window. Heres how they look today, rollers just slowly slowly creeping

you can see how dry the compost is in the last pic...

[piechnik99]

Whats the best way and time to get a dry stored over wintered Ensete going again ready for the new season?

I got mine out the loft over the weekend (stored with dahlia tubers over winter) and wondered if now was about time to repot it? For now I was going to put it a plant pot (with no soil) by the back window to see what happens???