Just like potted chyrsanthemums, azaleas, hydrangeas and poinsettias, potted specimens of Guzmania magnifica are popularly purchased while beginning to bloom, enjoyed as house plants through a long bloom cycle, but then discarded as bloom eventually deteriorates. They are rarely allowed to produce new pups that can be divided and grown into fresh new plants to bloom later.
The bright yellow, orange, red or pink bloom stalks, as well as their rich green basal foliage, are so glossy that they seem to be plastic. The colorful parts of the blooms are pointy strap shaped bracts that arch outward from upright stalks. The leaves below have the same shape, but are longer, and more densely arranged in neat rosettes. Tiny flowers are mostly obscured by the bracts.
Guzmania magnifica, likes bright ambient sunlight without direct sun exposure, and can tolerate significant shade, especially if grown for only a few months while blooming. They seem to like misting, but probably do not not need it. They should be watered only weekly to every two weeks, when the surface of the soil seems to be getting dry. Too much fertilizer might scorch the foliage.
The problem with this plant–and most plants in general–is that people tire of them long before they are allowed to “do their thing again.” They don’t want to look at just foliage, whether it’s an out of bloom orchid, an out of season poinsettia, or a bromeliad that will need to regenerate to rebloom.
Karla
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That is it exactly. If people do not discard them, they just stop watering them.
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Pups! I always wondered what those little offshoots were called. I have some Sansavieria hahnii that I have had since childhood and it has propagated itself and survived solely through pups.
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For many many agaves and yuccas, pups appear just before the main rosette blooms and dies, which can be a big mess for big agaves. Agaves that die after bloom are considered monocarpic, but I do not think that they are, since they survive with pups.
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