My ZZ Plant is a bit like yours... they are rather random plants I can tell you! Almost impossible to become "bushy" in the long term, because the oldest growth tends to die off with yellowing leaves after only a few seasons. However the new growth seems to always be bigger, stronger and healthier than the last which makes me think I must be doing something right! My answers would be 1) YES the new leaves are always very light green. 2) 3 weeks is a long time not to have watered a ZZ Plant unless its quite cold or been wet for long periods? 3) The Pot size looks fine to me, but it might be worth having a look at the roots and the tubers. Here is a link that might be useful: ZZ Plant Care

Hi, new to this thread. I just purchased 3 ZZ plants from HD the other day and re-potted 2 in a large ceramic pot and one by itself in a larger pot. I used MiracleGro Moisture Control. I did not add any perlite, etc. to the soil. I'm new to these plants. On watering issue. How often should I water, once a week or when I see the soil completely dry? What if I added 1/2 glass of water every week; it's not too much and not too little and the roots will have to work to get to the water. Any advice will be appreciated. One plant site under an east facing window and the other sits on my bath tub under a narrow east facing window, both are upstairs. TammyPie

Arbor, Callas are not nearly as rot resistant as Colocasias and also grow well at much lower temperatures. I would skip the plastic bags and plant them in the pots that you would like them to flower in to avoid root disturbance in just a few weeks. 12 weeks is the maximum dormancy time you need for aethiopicas and all the others to flower well. It may do more harm than good to store small tubers a lot longer. I can easily store large tubers completely dry for 9 months here in the humid south. When potting up, I water them in with water soluble fertilizer about 1/4 strength and then just keep moist, but not wet til they are up and growing, about 3 weeks at 68F. They will flower in about 10 weeks, but this is variable according to ambient temperatures. Keiko

This seems like a silly debate... it's a fact that always remains if the plant tissue completely dessicates and becomes bone-dry inside and out, it dies; this is true for any plant. It's also true for most plants that if it becomes too wet and moisture pools on the surface or the water causes the stem/roots to lose contact with air, it rots. And in the meantime, plants are variously adapted to maintain a mostly-constant water content inside themselves despite the variance in surrounding moisture. So a number of different methods will work for maintaining the appropriate amount of moisture inside the fleshy stem, also depending on your particular climate and the environment in which they are stored. So the big question is, how much humidity is in the air in your climate and specifically, in the location where you are storing the plants. In very dry climates, soaking a dormant stem, bulb, root or tuber in water periodically may replenish lost moisture. In very humid climates, soaking it in water may very will kill the plant tissue with mold if the water does not evaporate or if the tissues can't get oxygen, but in those climates it is unnecessary to soak the plants because water loss is very slow. I would suggest in this case you try the same methods you use storing plants like cannas and dahlias. You can completely control the environment by burying it in a pile of barely-moistened peat moss - just moist enough that the peat does not turn to dust if you blow on it, but not any more - in an OPEN grocery bag and setting that in a closed cardboard box, then putting it in a cool (but not freezing) garage. Then no matter what happens to your air humidity, the peat only very slowly loses moisture through the winter.