Hi Kris. Here are some excerpts I copied from a book I have, Variegated Plants; The Encyclopedia of Patterned Foliage by Susan Conder. (I have left out parts that refer to other colors of variegation.) Variegated plants originate naturally as random seedlings, or as sports - mutant variegated shoots on otherwise plain green plants. Yellow and white variegations are caused by imperfect or absent chloroplasts, the granule-like plastids within a cell which contain chlorophyll. In a white- or yellow-edged leaf, the green pigment functions normally in the inner layer of leaf cells, but the outer layer lacks chloroplasts, making the edges white, or contains a preliminary version of chlorophyll, protochlorophyll, creating yellow. A yellow- or white-centered leaf, with green edges, has a defective inner layer of leaf cells. The intensity of leaf colour is affected by the amount of light available. There are exceptions, but generally, variegated plants with glaucous foliage, such as rue and certain hostas, tolerate more sun than all-green kinds. Yellow-variegated leaves colour best in full sun or light shade. White- and cream-variegated leaves, such as variegated apple mint, tend to prefer shade, especially where the soil is dry. I'm confused, too since the explanation of how/why variegation occurs doesn't give any info for mottled or splotchy variegation like that of pothos. I don't like yellow flowers, but I do like yellow leaves - they look great with my other plants, most of which have purple leaves. Agree your plant looks healthy!

Sango Kaku should be able to tolerate full sun relatively easily. Lakes Nursery in NoCal recommends it for that sort of location and they grow in full sun here in the PNW without issue. I doubt the tree is properly established - it takes anywhere from 3-5 seasons for a tree of that size - and therefore is showing some signs of summer stress, which it will eventually grow out of. Watering "3 days a week" is kind of meaningless information. How many emitters, how long a duration (GPH?) and what kind of soil conditions do you have? It sounds like it is not getting enough water. A tree of that size (2" caliper?) will need 10-20 gallons per application. And that should percolate down to the base of the rootball or at least 12-16 inches. JM's do best with consistent soil moisture, so never too wet or too dry, always evenly moist..

Back in the 1980's the turf grass students at Michigan State University experimented with mulch mowing leaves, from many different trees, and on one of the plots mulch mowed a pile of leaves 6 inches thick into the turf. That plot did not receive any other form of nutrient supplement (fertilizer) and the next summer that plot grew greener, thicker, faster then any other grass plot. Without organic matter in the soil the Soil Food Web will not live since they depend on organic matter for survival. While reel mowers are very environmentally accetable they do not chop leaves well at all, however, you could rake those leaves and pile them up to get digested and turned into leaf mold and then you could spread them around after that, much more work then mulch mowing them into the soil where they fall.

Me. It was nice on Saturday, so I moved the whole lot out into the sun, including the starter flat - with lid on. It must have gotten way hot in there because when I checked a couple hours later the soil was parched and most of the seedlings fried. The Anaheims and Orange Manzanos did okay, possibly because they have deep roots. But I lost: all four 7 Pot Brain Strains and a Jonah F1, two Espelettes, three (four?) Chocolate Habs and Scotch Bonnets, one maybe two Twilights, a Black Cobra, a BJ, possibly a Poblano, 4 or 5 Scorpions and Douglahs, and a couple others I've blocked from my memory. Also a little Ch. Hab that grew up without cotyledons and had set a nice fat leaf. I almost named that one. True to form, the immortal BJ with no cots or roots is doing fine (assuming that it's truly alive at all...) Several have stood back up with watering, but the cots/leaves are crispy. I'll be amazed if they have the energy to set new leaves. We'll see. Fortunately, most everything that looked independently healthy had already been moved to pots, so many of these seedlings were weaklings. Darwin is rarely so just.