Hi Kathy,
I just bought my first 2 Elephant Ear bulbs. 6'tall green ones. There are 4 exotic ones I would like to get but at $18.00 a pop, OUCH!
I have over 180 hosta varieties. I can set you up. Have many in pots now for my annual perrenial sale. I would be happy to trade for brugs or whatever. E-mail me.
How is your Brug store doing?
Jerry

Also- I'm looking for large leaved tropical plants to fill in between my brugs- for sun and shade
(no Castor Bean please, highly invasive)
Thanks!

Hi Jerry-
How's it going? Did spring break for you yet? I'd like to buy those exotic EE's too- maybe we can find someone who'd like to share or trade with us! My you are SO busy! 180 Hostas in pots? Where do you find all the time for everything!
Sending you an email.
Take care-
kasha77

If you have a business tax id # you can order all kinds of ee's from agristarts for for cheap but you must buy in bulk. Another place to get cheap starter ee's in many of the new varieties is ebay. Around $5-$6 per plant and up to 4 shipped for $6.99
Here's two venders who sell the starter plants. I have bought from the first one several times and been happy. The little plants grow fast here. I haven't tried the second vender but am going to soon since it looks okay.
wellspring 100
floridahillnursery

Thank you for the info- SJN!
kasha77

I ordered from them last fall when they had their clearance. I planted in Oct, I can't believe how hardy those little guys are. I received plants in 2 inch pots, they made it thru the winter. I saw the video on the forum, and fell in love. Decided I would try, since they were on clearance. So far they are going great. I like the lime green one called Elena, the best. The color pops in my bed. I wish I would have bought more. I ordered from Wellsprings. Barbra

Agristarts is rockin'- maybe I'll start growing Hosta!
kasha77

Oh I forgot-
nothing happening with my store yet.
kasha77

Oh I was gonna tell you guys. For those who want to try a elephant ear on the cheap. Go to your grocery store and get a Malanga root. Some of the walmarts carry them or if you have a grocer that has a good selection of international foods or international food type store they may have it. It is not a taro (regular EE) root. It is longer brownish in color and may have brown wiry hairs on it.
Anyhow, it is kinda fun to get stuff from the grocery store produce section and grow it in your yard, aside from being cheap and easy lol.

So someone told me about them and I grew some in 2009 and they have kept growing lol. They are green with some marbling in the leaves and are thicker and waxier than regular EEs.

Closeup of the leaf
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It is the one in the front
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SJN-
Thanks for the tip- I love the idea! How wide and long are the leaves, and how tall does this one grow? Off to Walmart I go!
kasha77

I just received an order from floridahillnursery.com. Wow! Big starter plants, very well packed and big healthy root systems. I'll definitely be ordering from them again. I picked up 4 varieties of EE: hilo beauty, mojito, frydek, and nigra. I also picked up six new bananas.

As far as fast growing foliage plants, you can't beat canna musafolia. Prolific reproducers as well. If you like I can send you a couple of rhizomes for postage.

Garrett.

Garrett-
thank you for the link- I'm definitely excited about Florida Hill Nursery- seems like they have a wide variety of tropicals and I didn't see anything over $6.99! And yes- May I have a couple rhizomes of canna musafolia for postage? Sounds like it gets pretty big! Thank you again!
kasha77
email me and I'll send you my address and postage! kathysuleski@yahoo.com

Garrett!! What Nana's did ya get??

Kylie

Hi Kathy, I have quite a few hosts myself and you posted some nice comments on my post "order just came in have pics..." in this forum. I'll have a list put together soon and can forward it to you if you would like. Mine are still dormant but will be ready to divide soon. Let me know if you're interested.
Ken

Kylie,

I got 2 each: ensete maurelii (I overwintered two each of the past 2 winters, but as they don't often throw new pups I thought I'd add to my collection), thai black and siam ruby. The thai black are close to 20" tall and already have black pseudostems, the siam rubys are already showing red.

I ordered from going-bananas last year (very healthy plants as well), but quite a bit more expensive. I don't expect to ever get fruit in VA so I'm just interested in the folliage aspect.

Sorry to hijack. Kathy, I sent you an e-mail. I'll get some rhizomes mailed out to you this week.

Garrett.

That's fine- thanks so much Garrett!
kasha77

I grow Thai black bananas. I left some out as an experiment in a small pot and guess what? They came back and already almost 2 ft tall lol. They pup easily as well. I like the dark stems.

I forgot to answer the Malanga question about size. I had mine in a pot and got the leaves close to 3 ft. in a pot. I would say the height was about 5 1/2 feet. I don't know how big they would get in the ground but they would probably try to take over the world lol.

Hi Kasha!
Do you have any shade for Black Magic elephant ear?
I have banannas but don't know the name. I have hostas but not the giant ones.
Thanks Girl,
Patsey

Hi Patsey-
Yes I have a lovely shade garden that I'm trying to fill right now, what did you have in mind? I have 1 little black magic ee. He's lonely!
kasha77

Garrett
My Maurelii is just breaking dormancy ..I love Thai Black one of my Favs.. I brought him in for the Winter and he is also just coming to life.. I had a Goldfinger that bloomed last Winter in the house .. You could get a bloom ..with out a GH probably not the fruit.. It is still very exciting!! ;0)

Kylie

Kylie... do you bring in your siam ruby for the winter? I killed 2 in the gh so far LOL! I'm gonna go buy another one but I don't wanna kill it this time. Do you keep it dry in the winter?

I lost mine last yr from being out of town so much.. BUT it lived in the house for several Winters in a semi-dormant state.. Barely any water.. I would love to get another one as well.. I really miss the guy!!! LOL

Loretta, I have 4 siam ruby reds, that I left outside thruout the winter. I covered them in February when we had the 2 weeks of freezing weather. I covered them with a sheet and bungie cord, with 4 inches of mulch. All 4 made it thru the freezes. The one that I planted on the South side of the house, did not even freeze back, it is doing great, its about 4ft tall, and has pups. The 2 I planted on the East side, did not freeze back to the ground, but did have to be cut back, they are about 2 ft tall right now, no pups. The one I planted on the North side froze back to the ground, it is slowly coming back. I did not know where to plant them, so I planted them on diffrent sides, the one on the south side, seemed to multiply much faster then the other 3. I have a sprinkler system, so they were watered every other day, even when it froze. This is zone 9b coastal, Rockport Texas. I hope this information helps you. Barbra

I have ordered from both Wellspring and FloridaHill Nursery and was very pleased with what I got from both.
Bill

Thanks hunnybunny maybe I will try that next time. I need to order a few more Siams so they can get big enough to survive by next year. In winter of 2009/2010 we got into the teens and that's when I lost a great deal of my nanners. This past winter doesn't seem like it was too bad but still replacing stuff from the last time. Last year we moved so I had too much going on and didn't replace too many plants so catching up now :)
Now, if I could keep the baby ducks out of my stuff it would be all good lol. They like to nibble at the leaves of younger plants and jump up in the fountains and ponds and cause havoc. Too bad they are so darn cute.
SJN

I have three or four absolutely giant elephant ear corm/bulbs available for postage or trade. They're about four years old each, having been lifted each fall. The ones that went back in the ground a few weeks ago will probably have leaves 4-5 feet long and the grove usually makes 10 feet tall by August.

KimKa

Hello Kasha77, We will be carrying an elephant ear called Borneo Giant next week and they get HUGE I have a personal garden with Giganta, Borneo giant, Calidora and Thai giant. My personal fav. is the Gigantea I will go snap a photo real quick. BRB
p.s. I snapped one of my grapes too. : )

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I can't get that pic link to work. If you have photo bucket you can copy and paste in the html link.