Couple more pics

Oh yeah, these are both in my loft which is pretty bright. There’s a sky light which provides a lot of overhead natural light, no direct sunlight on either plant though, and I leave the ceiling light on all day for the plants. It’s very hot and dry up there.

I bet it is just too warm. If you don't want to move it get a humidifier. They can be cheap and your plants in a room like that really need it.

Really?!? I didn’t even think of that. I kind of figured tropical plants wouldn’t mind heat, but it is actually really dry

up there to now. I actually do have two humidifiers for my plants, and I even had one of them up there, but with summer it got super bright in the loft, so I moved all of the Calatheas and marantas to a shadier spot in the house and, of course, the humidifier went with them. The second one is in my bedroom with a bunch of other plants. It is really really hot up there, I can barely stand more than 10 minutes. Ok, so I was going to move them to a shadier spot today anyway, but maybe the temperature difference will help too. Wow, thank you so much. I honestly hadn’t even thought of that. I will move them today and, hopefully, less bright light, cooler temp, and perfecting my watering technique will, finally, make these two happy!

Thanks again for your advice. I definitely appreciate it.

I grow several Dieffs and I think that the roots on yours are gone due to inconsistent watering: when they are too dry the roots dry up and then when you water well, they just rot away. they have very fleshy white roots like Aglaonemas (you are having a problem with both ..it can be the same thing with root decline). the dry/rotted roots will be brown husks.

it would be very helpful if you could lay the pot on the side and gently pull them out of it to have a look at the state of roots. you can insert some sort of small shovel to help to get the root-ball intact . when they have few or no roots left they drop leaves..

if most of the roots are gone you'll have to reroot them. In my experience it's best to reroot in pure perlite to prevent any rotting particles in the mix.

I also think that your soil is too heavy: gravel is quite useless, replace it's share with large size perlite or coir-chips to improve aeration. I grow in roughly 2:3:3 coir-chips/perlite/African violet mix, but small cuttings I put in 1:1 perlite: av-mix.

and by the way all my Aglaonemas and Dieffs are getting soft sun-light, direct but dappled. Eastern window with early soft sun is best , not too hot - they will have good variegation, otherwise they'll go mostly green.

I have sev pink (thai) ags and 1 'Silver bay'. the green ags can be in the center of bright room completely no sun, and they are OK. but pink definitely need some weak sun to be happy.

I propagated a huge Dieff that was given to me right in water. The plant had been growing in water for 20 years at work, and upon retirement the guy gave them to me. The roots were a little smelly though the plants looked fine. I chopped them off and was really shocked how quickly they grew nice thick roots. It was so easy.

Remove the yellowing leaves. Why keep them on? Have you checked for spider mites?

Maybe time for new potting mix but only you can decide that. You could chop them off at the base, root the tops in water or a clean potting media, and let the mother plant send up new plants. Compare the results then.

Ok, so I took a closer look at 3/8 Aglaos and I think they look ok? Maybe I’m wrong though. There were some dry old roots that I removed from each, but the rest look nice, thick, and white. However, my Pink Dalmatian was two large stems and one little one and I gently tugged on the little one and it just came right out of the soil. I dug up the larger two stems and could see that the little guy had broken off one and it definitely had issues. It was very dry where it broke off and only had two not very healthy looking roots attached. I would like to restart the little stem, but am not sure where to cut. I also have never propagated in H2O before and, so far, I haven’t had issues propagating only in potting substrate. I’ve read that water roots are different than soil roots and if you propagate in water then transfer to potting media, the roots will die. But then again, my mother-in-law just rooted a dracaena in water and then potted it up no problem And those roots were AMAZING! Would you all recommend media or water?

.

Im not opposed to trying a new mix or extremely attached to what I’m using. I just found the mix I’ve made has worked the best for me so far. Every bag of potting media I use, except cactus/palm, seems to get really hard/compact/heavy, even with lots of perlite. I would get a new plant and repot it with ”houseplant” or “indoor plant” or “moisture control potting mix”, etc (I tried a bunch of different kinds) and then I watered the plant and once the media dried, the top became like concrete. When I would try water again, the water would sit or pool on top and when I tried to stick my finger in I had to punch through the top. I felt like that could not be good for the plants and I never had that happen with cactus mix, so I kept using it. I add the gravel because I don’t like the way the perlite looks when theres a lot. Before I started using the gravel, I did only use perlite and media, maybe 1:1, and at that ratio the perlite is really noticeable and it turns brown every time you water and, I know it’s stupid, but I just thought it was ugly. So I found a big bag of uncoated aquarium gravel that had different sized rocks and I tried adding that and I liked it.

I did check for spider mites and do not see any evidence of those. I looked with a magnifying glass, but will continue to monitor.

Ok, I’m attaching some photos of 3 Aglaos that I looked at today. I will also look at the roots of the dieffs, maybe tomorrow or this weekend, and see how they look too.

Thank you all for your replies and great advice and help. I greatly appreciate everyone trying to help me.

Aglao 1 (pink butterfly)

Aglao 2 (Pink Dalmatian)

Aglao 3 (moonstone)-

Here is the little guy that broke off of the Pink Dalmatian that I would like to restart, but am not sure how. Where would I cut it, in between the green and white or lower only in white area? Will it still propagate, even though it already lost its leaves?

And then here is a pic of the potting mix I’ve been using. This was from one of the Aglaos above. It’s Cactus/palm soil, gravel, perlite.

m-mm..:) your ag's roots are quite nice. so, why do you have a problem with them? may be just older leaves go yellow? that's normal though. they branch, grow new shoots from soil after a few years, as they get older. but usually they keep growing only at the tip, dropping older leaves. it's how they grow...I just cut and reroot then ev 3-4 years. and it's best to keep them in smallest pots that can fit the roots.

I keep mine on water-wicks: so that I don't have to deal with them drying out, as I travel for 2-3 weeks or more and they keep going by themselves. yah! but for that you need 40% perlite and some peat (1/3?) in the mix for wicking. but cactus mix usually contains peat by the way :).

I root best in flooded perlite: fill the cup (no holes) with perlite, fill with water to 1/3 approx. add a few drops of 3% peroxide to keep water from going sour. tent. stick yr cutting in. wait. ag's take very long -5-8 weeks normal. may be 3 mo too :(.

same with Dieffs unless you use heat-mat: then 4-5 weeks and u'll have roots.

without the leaves is problematic. you could try, but that can take 6 mo :). ag's are VERY slow. and sometimes canes will just die. Dieffs are very slow too.

yr mix looks good. large perlite is better then gravel. more functional, it actually holds onto water so to speak..better then gravel. gravel is heavy - better for outdoor pots.

since you dislike the look, put some gravel in mix instead of perlite for top 1 " for looks, instead of perlite. I cover the soil of my sucs with aquarium gravel. it allows air thru - no problem. I use coco-chips instead of bark in mixes : they re-wet very fast (no need to soak if dry) and aerate better then bark.

also for rewetting the mix adding coir dust (peat) is good : it's very fine coco shell fragments : 10-20-30% . I use half AV soiles (peat) half coco-peat for 'soil portion' of the mix.

wow! I don't think I've seen such huge ones inside anywhere!

ND,

You know I've tried to help, so hopefully you'll see that while I don't mean to be a bother, your threads are getting too confusing: your Diffenbachia thread has Aglaonema pix & your Aglos thread has Diff pix.

Could you pls stay on the one matching the thread title? Otherwise it's confusing WHICH plant is being discussed. Also it's not so necessary to post the same pix on both threads, redundant AND confusing, tho' maybe only to those following both threads ;>)

I'm convinced the Diff was burned, I'd move it to semi-shade at least.

HC: Nice plants, I've got my first Cutlass, an Ag I'd never seen before. A youngster compared to your pix.

ND: a tip for ya, that last pix which HC said showed good roots? For that chunk of rooted stem, sprinkle the bottom of that w/household Cinnamon & then shake it off before planting it. Dont water for a day, The Cinnamon acts as an anti-fungal to help stave off root rot which gives the thing a chance to get re-established.

i'm the one who brought up ag's from another post. I read both but decided to answer here, since the answers provided here were not sufficient in my opinion.

both species require very similar care and they had same symptoms, why not mention it? I am not going to repost in 2 threads same lengthy recommendations. if it were different people that would be another matter, but with the same person I think it's not that important to be fussy about title. IF OP chooses to cross-discuss - it's her thread, she can certainly do so.

Oh, sorry ND, my mistake.

Of course she can do so, Petrushka, I just found it too confusing, that's all.

Thx, I hadn't realized it was you who brought in the Ags comment.

More importantly, yeah those roots all DO look fine!

Ugh, I replied to this post a week ago and, for whatever reason, I guess it didn’t post. So take two-

Karen- I’m sorry, I was worried about it getting confusing too, but Petrushka brought up the Aglaos here and I’m happy to get as much help and advice as possible, so I replied on both posts. I did think about how confusing it might be and it was confusing to just me trying to go between both posts, making sure I had similar info.

HCMcD- OMG, I have major agloa envy over yours!!! They’re just Amazing!!!!!

Petrushka- Thank you for your advice and comments.

i very much appreciate everyone’s input. One question, well two. Karen thinks that my Dieffenbachis are sunburned. Is this possible if they only get indirect and artificial light? ive moved them now, but they were both upstairs with only a skylight, no windows, and I left the ceiling fan light on all day for extra light. The skylight is tiny and in the middle of the room. Both dieffs were all the way in the corner of the room, about 4-5 fr away from skylight, but 3 ft under ceiling fan light. Either way, I did love them both to my bedroom where they will actually get some direct sun, but it’s darker throughout the day. It will be crazy, but educational, if they do better getting actual direct sunlight, but less indirect.

Second question- what type of store brand potting soil/medium do you all buy to mix with your amendments to make your final mix? I’m just curious if there is a better store bought bag potting mix that I haven’t tried yet. I basically have tried mostly miracle grow products from my local Home Depot.

Thank you everyone for your help and input!

I only use Miracle Gro the last several years. I buy the extra large bags of it at HD or Sam's. I sometimes buy an extra large bag of perlite for propagation and sometimes cactus mix, seed starting mix, and long fiber sphagnum moss for terrariums.