Have a nice spath, what daylilies do you have?

Hi Golden and Welcome to Houseplants.. Peace lily's seem to be a problem the last couple months. There have been several thread regarding this plant. How long after your friend repotted did the plant start acting up? Do you know what size the previous pot was, and what size she planted into. PL's do NOT like large pots..they prefer to be semi-smug. One reason is, many people have a tendency to overwater, therefore soil stays wet..You did mention the soil was moist, but how long after he/she watered did you test its soil? Normally one should hold off on fertilizer after repotting, but I don't consider this an major issue. As long as fertilizer directions were followed, so PL wasn't overfed. As long as PL isn't sitting in front of ac vent, it shouldn't do harm, then again, ac takes moisture from the air..still I don't think leaves would yellow/grow smaller from dry air. They'd most likely brown, I'd think anyway. To be honest, we as growers should water by schedule..Once a wk may be fine, but you have to take certain things into consideration..when a room is ac'd, it stays cooler..in the process, soil takes longer to dry..So, if she/he is water once a wk, and soil is moist, this isn't helping. She/he needs to test soil..stick a finger down into soil..if wet wait a few days, then retest. If dry, (crumbly) give it a drink. Water soil thoroughly, but wait till it's semi-dry before giving another drink. A larger pot holds more water too..and depending on material of pot makes a difference..For instance a clay pot dries out faster than plastic. Tell your friend to water when soil feels dry..not bone dry, but crumbly dry. One last thing, but this is a last resort..tell friend to check for pests. Mainly mites and mealy. But there are other pests that attack PL's too. Do you know how to check for bugs? Toni

Leucoplast was a term I co-opted myself for variegation. You probably aren't going to find many books that call them that, but it is correct with respect to the Latin: "colorless/white plastid." I did find a review paper that used the same terminology: http://www.springerlink.com/content/01148l09u2553067/ I don't know if you will have access to these journals (through JSTOR etc), but some scientists have studied variegation. Looking into the literature, it looks like nucleus-controlled non-chimeric variegation is more common than I previously thought and some common internet resources (e.g. Wikipedia) would have suggested. Still, it is clear that non-viral variegations are extremely common and possibly much more common than viral variegations. Some examples of genetic variegation. Nuclear control (non-chimeral): *Saintpaulia ionantha http://www.jstor.org/pss/2444194 ****There are also chimeral variegations in African violets *Dieffenbachia "Camille" http://jhered.oxfordjournals.org/content/77/4/285.short *Arabadopsis thaliana http://jhered.oxfordjournals.org/content/84/2/138.abstract Chimeral: *Ficus rubiginosa 'Variegata' http://aob.oxfordjournals.org/content/94/1/51.full *Tobacco http://www.jstor.org/pss/2440210 *Barley and Rice http://www.genetics.org/cgi/reprint/13/6/544.pdf ****Figure three is a very good visual explanation of the concept. Clearly non-viral variegation is common to many groups. One will notice that an aroid is reported (Dieffenbachia) with nonviral genetic variegation. My recollection is that Dieffenbachia variegation is natural, as in D. seguina and D. regina, and cultivars simply exaggerate the variegation. I wasn't able to access the fulltext of that article, so I can't say quite as much. This paper reports Epipremnum aureum, another variegated aroid, as natural variegation (a surprise to me): http://www.springerlink.com/content/d005p75vg1171860/fulltext.pdf. It looks like this is controlled by nuclear genes and is non-chimeral. Another example of natural aroid variegation is in Schismatoglottis calyptrata (http://www.springerlink.com/content/wmeda9kpt7d2bnga/). Another paper shows/mentions natural variegation in Homalomena and Caladium (http://www.springerlink.com/content/5608833712u8537r/). I think it is clear that natural variegations are relatively stable and under genetic control, rather than being virally transmitted. They frequently function to deter herbivores by mimicking damaged leaves. It seems clear (IMHO) that at least in many cases, aroid variegation is not due to artificial infection by viruses. No doubt it has been reported for several plants, such as Zamioculcas, but I don't think that one can conclude that all aroid variegations (even artificial) are necessarily viral in origin.

I started putting my plants practically up against the glass on the windowsills as soon as I had more than a few hours of light coming in, so they went from almost all artificial light to about 3 hours of bright sunshine in their leaves with artificial light the rest of the day. They immediately started growing much more vigorously but showed no ill effects from the better light. I've got a dracaena and multiple ficus benjaminas and scheffleras.