I just love touching the leaves of these plants. Kind of feels like a fruit roll-up but not sticky (I hope!!) LOL! It could be something else, fo' sho'. There are so many Philos, it was just my guess. If the orange new leaf is an anomaly, that probably indicates it's something else. Starting to have serious regret over not even asking how much for the plain green flowering section. I'm sitting here missing it pretty bad somehow. That can't be part of the same plant, and those hot pink flowers were amazing! I think that might have been Philo 'Moonlight'. Either way, the giant plant no doubt blew me away!! Not the kind of thing you usually see at a store. I knew I was home even before I saw that, somebody there obviously loves plants, it's not just a store. Can't say enough about how good it felt to just be at such a place for the first time in the better part of a decade, let alone seeing a lot of plants that I didn't know what they were, that "exploring the jungle" sensation. So the dark red/burgundy Philo I mentioned burns really easily and I'm assuming this plant is likely to also. I think they would look smashing planted together, will do that while repotting stuff, one less pot too. That one grows really slowly too, about 1 leaf per 5-7 weeks.

Hi Gary, you might have better luck forcing new variegated growth by taking a tip cutting, or simply pinching the growing tip off. This forces new growth from nodes further back on the vine. There's a node at every leaf on the stem, this is typical of all vining Philodendrons. My experience with variegated vining Philos is that the growing tip rarely produces more variegated leaves if it produces 3 or more 'all green' leaves, or in this case 'all reddish-brown'. While I think these dark leaves are gorgeous in their own right, variegation is the reason most people grow this plant. The new growth produced at nodes further back on the vine is much more likely to be variegated. If new growth doesn't have variegated leaves, cut back to new nodes further back on the vine. You should eventually get good variegated growth. You can root these non-variegated cuttings you're taking, pot them for yourself or give them away to someone who appreciates a beautiful dark-leaved Philo. You still have time to do this, since you're in Calif zone 10. Tracy, you're obviously not going to do any cutting, being in zone 2 and approaching fall. I think your two 4 inch plants being put into an 8 inch pot is fine. Just watch your watering since your temps are going to start being cooler, and the plants will want to slow down and will want less water. That said, don't let them dry out completely, but make sure the top inch or so is dry before you water again. Yes, Pink Princess is a slow grower, there's not much you can do about it. In late spring, be sure to fertilize it, I always cut the recommended amount to half or 1/4th, and fertilize more often. Regarding the all-white leaf, you can leave it or cut it off. As long as it has other leaves with chlorophyll to produce food, the leaf doesn't hurt the plant, but it's of no benefit either. I have variegated Monstera deliciosa 'Borsigiana' that sometimes will start producing all-white leaves, many in a row. This growth is no good whatever and I cut the vine back to the variegated leaves to make it produce new variegated growth from the nodes. I throw the all-white cutting away since it can't support itself with no chlorophyll. Syngonium podophyllum variegata does the same thing on occasion, and it also produces all-green growth, which I cut off. Post me at chammer@cfl.rr.com if you have more questions. Russ central Fla

I have an escallonia that looks like Pink Princess, which I rescued from a local coffee roaster's landscape redo - they were being replaced. It's very happy in my southern Puget Sound (close to the water) location and is probably 12-14 feet tall. I keep it pruned back so it doesn't overtake the walkway at the side of my house, but the last few years the lower part of the bush has lots of dead branches, while the upper parts are very healthy. It's in a place where it doesn't really matter (can't really see the lower part from the house) but I'm wondering if I cut out some portions of the dead, back to the main part of the trunk, might it resprout under there? Or should I just trim it back and plant some different shade loving shrubs to fill in the hollow area when the dead is removed?

I have Ernest Markham (deep purple/red) if you'd like to exchange that.