Does a plumeria perform, grow better in a container with lot's of root room to grow, or almost root bound?
Not for drainage or root rot purposes, since my soils drain fast. I mean in reference for room to grow.

Does a plumie grow better and bigger, larger blooms not in a root bound situation?

Thank you so much for anyone's time

Mike

Totally containerized, I think larger pots keep the growing zones of the roots cooler. In small pots, rootbound plants have their most tender roots right up against the plastic pot, which can get really hot! so the roots can die and the plant gets stressed -- at least in our hot summers.

All that said, my containerized plumerias seem to do BEST when the pots are sunk down in to the garden soil (after the soil has warmed!). Then roots can venture out (and you'd be surprised at how far they travel in one season!). Just make sure the pot has large size holes drilled in the sides.

Most of these larger plants were sunk in the ground -- partly for stabilization, and partly to keep the roots cooler and allow roots to grow into the ground.

Putting a potted plant with slits, into the ground, allows the roots to grow outside the pot into the soil. This helps avoid a perched water table in the pot by the earth wicking out the extra water at the same time..So it serve two purposes.
The extra water wicks into the soil,and it also allows the roots to spread beyond just being contained in the pot.

Putting a small plant into a large pot only increases your chances of root rot, because the water in the soil in the oversized container is not able to be wicked out, nor absorbed quick enough from the roots that havn't yet taken enough time to develope enough to absorb the water, which in turn allows the soil mix in the container to dry out fast enough. The perched water remains in the container all the while increasing the chances a root rot.

The soil stays wet far too long, unless of course you are using a very coarse soilless mix that does not allow a PWT at all to develope in the container without help of the earth to wick it out. Then you can plant a 2inch plant into a 5 gallon pot if you would like. But most do not use this kind of soilless mix.

So I would say both scenarios are completely different.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

Mike..:-)

I've been growing plumies for around 6 years now and have them in containers ranging from gallon size to the big Rubber Maid containers with the rope handles. With the biggest container we drilled the holes in the sides (rather than the bottom) about 5-6" off the ground and filled at least half that area with pebbles. The remaining balance of the container is filled with a coarse landscape mix and topped off with several layers of coarse mulch. All my plumies are watered via drip irrigation.

My thoughts on the size pots for plumies is kind of like sizing pots for African Violets. The size of pot needs to be calculated using the size of the plant and the environment in which they're grown.

A small plant will grow considerably if given the right growing conditions, but a large plant might not grow quite as much in a year, relatively speaking.

Here, where it's dry and hot, a larger container is almost a must to combat the heat around the roots and to have a reservoir of moisture so watering doesn't HAVE to be a daily thing.

If I lived where it was cooler and/or wetter I would definitely want to downsize my pots considerably, allowing the roots to be more easily warmed and the soil to more easily dry out.

I've also thought about partially burying my pots like I've seen at a couple houses around town here. The problem with that ~for me~ was during the drought I would have had to water the plant AND the ground around it; keeping it sequestered, if you will, allowed me to water for the plant alone. If I lived someplace that had sufficient rain, like Houston, I'd bury them every year!

Hope it helps you..

Mike..:-)

Unless your plumie is a large tree that has been overwintered outside of soil (i.e. hanging in a closet or garage) or you did a severe root prune for winter storage, then the chances are the the root ball is going to be an appropriate size for the plant. And even those root pruned plants will, in order to support their size, build a sizable new root system quickly or suffer the consequence of dying back or dying completely.

"Water from the pot goes out the holes and waters the area where the roots grow so you don't have to water the area around the pot."

In a drought state the surrounding ground will wick more than its fair share away from the plant, leaving both in a state of depleted water resources.

And I'm still curious why is it assumed that the pot will have a perched water table? If the soil in a container drains well then a perched water table will probably never enter the picture. Thus, the real trick to the 'size of container' question is really making sure your soil is suitable for the plant it's being used for and, in this case, that means it must drain fairly quickly. After that it's about not overwatering and then making sure it has enough root space for the present and that year's growth.

.
Give a man a fish, you feed him for the day. Teach a man to fish, you feed him for life.

I never assumed that. :-)

I am saying that the mixes that I use and the ones I showed you are an example of medias that do not hold a PWT. If you have one that does the same , then by all means use it..

They were just examples, because to be quite blunt, MOST of, if not ALL bagged soilless and soil mixes, along with other medias some decide to use, do hold water more in a pot than a plumeria desires in most areas, no matter where we live. If I use the mix my dad uses for his tomatos, I would loose my plumies in a week, no matter how hot or sunny.
I have a cousin who consistantly killed her plants from root rot in Phoenix, Arizona,in particular plumeria and gardenias, from bagged soil mixes that stayed wet far too long.

And if it wasn't from that, then it was from soil breaking down to rapidly, decomposing, the fine particles clogging up air spaces in her soil, which in turn got compacted and suffocated the roots over time. Therefore the reason I use a soilless mix that does not collaspe in a short period of time, which again supports a PWT..

If your soil drains well as you say, and can stay that way for a long period of time, then by all means, use it. You might appreciate a soil mix that stays wet for a long period of time, because of your extreme heat. I do not know. But I could never get away with it here.

Remember, I only answered your question as you asked.
You asked if both scenerios were the same, and showed you the difference as thoroughly as I could.
I never assumed that all soil has a PWT.
And I always tell everyone, to use what works best for you in your area, as I use what works best for me in mines.;-)

For me, the gritty mix is the key to my success. For you, it might be a bagged soil. Your expereince and knowledge of soil as you stated, your cultural habits and enviromental factors will determine what you decide to use and what works best for you and your plumies.

Good luck. Great conversation.

Mike

Thanks Bill, by the way.;-)

In responding to my question to him, you said, "Putting a potted plant with slits, into the ground, allows the roots to grow outside the pot into the soil. This helps avoid a perched water table in the pot by the earth wicking out the extra water at the same time..So it serve two purposes." Your answer gave the appearance that PWT was the initial and, thus, the most important problem addressed in this scenario. I address this primarily because we 4 are not the only ones who will be reading or who have read this thread. You have someone that is new to all of this read this and it makes some very generalized statements that tend to lead the reader to a deduction that may not be a truth in their case.

Personally, I mix all my own soil; I even use a cement mixer to do it. And one of my tricks to keeping the moisture in my soil without keeping the soil waterlogged is polymer crystals. Do I suggest those for everyone that grows plumies? Heavens no! But for me they work. I also use sand in the soil I mix for my plumies. In Hawaii the soil where they grow has a high sand content, as it does down in Mexico where they are indigenous. And the 4 of us know that sand has pretty much broken down as far it's going to in our lifetime.

What I find the most interesting about all of this is that you asked the initial question and now you are answering most of the questions, even though a large part of them go directly to your initial question, which I think dave_in_nova answered beautifully.

BTW My 1st question - asked of Bill - was asked more in question to his reasoning than the actual idea described.

Always learning something new,

Donna

This was my thread I started.

You stopped by and instead of offering me help, you asked a question that totally changed the subject matter, and I had an opportunity to explain your question abouyt something I know about.

So now this conversation is between you and Bill. You are right, sorry fior the intrusion.

It is obvious you are not here for a friendly discusiion with me, but just to prove someone wrong and make a point. Thanks anyway....

"Putting a small plant into a large pot results in not enough roots to pull enough water from the soil so the plant is in more danger of rot damage." different from putting a potted plant in the ground and letting it grow new roots from the cuts? Aren't both scenarios about putting a plant with a small root system into a large growing area?

Thank you Dave and Bill for your acknowledge ment that I know something about other aspects of plumeria container growing and your help..;-)

But I didn't ask the question of you and I only asked it AFTER the initial question had been answered and quite well, I might add.

""Putting a small plant into a large pot results in not enough roots to pull enough water from the soil so the plant is in more danger of rot damage." different from putting a potted plant in the ground and letting it grow new roots from the cuts? Aren't both scenarios about putting a plant with a small root system into a large growing area? <-[MY QUESTION]

Thank you Dave and Bill for your acknowledge ment that I know something about other aspects of plumeria container growing and your help..;-) <- [YOUR 2nd RESPONSE]"

"It is obvious you are not here for a friendly discusiion with me, but just to prove someone wrong and make a point."

IMO it has been the other way around.

I posted several replies ago that I was concerned for the others that would be reading this thread and getting the wrong idea. Not everyone has the luxury of an education in plants &/or soils or years of growing plumies & beings able to see what has worked for them or not OR even the benefit of having worked with plumies for a couple of years and misleading info can be cruel to these folks. I know, I was one at one time.

I would hate for someone to needlessly be turned away from this glorious plant simply because they thought it was too hard to learn. PWT is a fact, but learning to use the soils in the fashion that nature intended is a far easier process than "read[ing] several times before [you] understood what" it was saying.

When I asked my 1st question in this thread I was trying to understand where BILL was going with it - you turned it into something else. C'mon, why not set egos aside and try to LEARN FROM EACH OTHER?

An expert I am NOT - by my definition or anyone else's! Nor do want to be. (Once you think you know it all, there's no 'need' to learn more. )

I totally understand what you are saying about going from tiny to giant in a single leap. (I 'stair step' my plant's pot sizes, as you do.)

My thought was about putting a container in the ground someplace that has daytime temps, say 70-85, with cool night temps, they get enough precipitation for the ground to stay semi-moist most of the time and their ground's soil is something other than extremely fast draining. Doesn't partial planting them in the ground afford problems to a plumeria, rather than keeping them in an environment that you can more closely control?

For me, come winter time, my plants go into my hoop house where I can determine how much water they get at any given time. Since putting them 'away' for the winter they've been watered once (& only because we had warm spell) and until late December we had days akin to a temperate climate's spring or fall. My thinking on watering them more is that I would be opening them up to rot. Which brings me back to the scenario above....

What am I missing in the comparison?

With thanks for your patience,

Donna

If I transplant the plant directly into garden soil (eliminate the pot) and the soil drains well, then no problem (provided soils are warm). This is better than an overly large pot. But poor draining garden soil is as bad as a very large pot.

Feel free to not read any of this!!

Putting it into the ground isn't the 'do all to end all'. You have to be as careful in timing, location, etc as you do with planting in a pot, this just allows you to ~for a period of time, depending on all those variables~ give your plant unlimited room to stretch it's roots.

What I was getting from the other posts was that once your plant was actively growing you could partially plunge it and it would grow happily until temps were cold enough for it to go into cold storage. Now it makes sense! Thank you!!

Now a new question, please:

When you root prune it one year and then 'bring it back to life' the next year, do you have to do anything special to help it sustain itself until it's root system is replaced or does it simply not put out the leaves it had when it was last actively growing?

Again, thank you!!

Not sure. Might depend on how much you root prune. On my plunged potted plants I just trim the roots that have escaped the pot holes before I bring them in for the Winter. Then (ideally) I would do some circumferential root pruning before they leaf out, and repot them -- maybe to one size larger pot. I really don't know how much this sets them back. But, I'm sure they won't grow as fast as if their roots have NEVER been disturbed in the ground. I'm guessing the more you root prune, the longer it will take the plant to really get going again and support a full canopy of leaves. Just guessing. But I have no choice. These plants soon get too heavy to move, or too tall for their winter home.

Also, the length of 'dormancy' matters. The longer the dormancy period, the harder it is on our plants. Your dormancy period in 9a is much shorter than ours (7a). And in Hawaii, dormancy is probably measured in 'weeks' rather than our many 'months'!

I also grow brugmansia and I am amazed at how DRASTICALLY they can be pruned for winter storage and how quickly these plants take off in summer. I think plumerias are similar in that they store a lot of nutrients in their trunks. So they can regenerate roots from a severe pruning without too much trauma.

I was also going to repot them this spring as they have used enough soil to need a refill, so your last post is doubly helpful.

Which brings me to another question:

Since I will be putting them in the ground partially and will be repotting them anyway, what would be your thoughts on me doing a bit of root pruning and putting them in smaller containers? Right now they are in the Rubber Maid tubs and I was thinking that possibly I could root prune them down to 3-5 gallon containers.

Would that idea work?

Would that be a large enough container?

Grateful for your willingness to share,

Donna

It seems that plant growth is best when the roots are actively colonizing new soil.

In a pot, as already mentioned, the danger lies in the fact that drainage is typically not as good as that of the Earth. This places the roots in an unsafe situation unless you can amend the potting mix to improve aeration significantly.

When the roots have colonized a pot, the plant will slow growth until the pot size is stepped up, at which point the roots are once again roaming into new space.

In the ground, there is also competition from surrounding vegetation but theoretically, free root run should be ideal, all else being equal.

A plunged pot affords the roots the opportunity to escape and thus, enhance seasonal growth as moisture and nutrition are no longer limited to the chemistry and physics in the pot alone.

YMMV

x