Overwintering Elephant Ears

This past Spring, I bought the elephant ear plants listed below as 3-inch tall babies and each plant has done very well in my back yard (zone 6b). I've read conflicting advice on which of these plants can be overwintered in a dormant state, especially the Colocasia's, as they reportedly don't produce large corms to take them through a dormant state. Thus, I've come to this forum with the following questions needing your experience and insight.

► 1. For the plants that can be stored dormant, should I wait for the first freeze and cut off the damaged foliage or should I dig the plants up now and allow the leaves to naturally dry out before storing the corms in peat?
(I have several amaryllis that I dig up with their leaves intact, and they have survived over ten years.)

► 2. For the plants that will be overwintered in pots, I plan on leaving only 3 leaves per plant and re-potting them into smaller containers. Is this ok?

My plans for the individual plants are listed below. As I have limited space in the house, I'd prefer to store as many as possible in a dormant state.
► 3. Can I (or should I) change any of these plans?


PLAN TO STORE DORMANT
● Alocasia Portora (matures at 6-8 ft.)
- 4 feet tall

● Alocasia Calidora (Persian Palm) (matures at 5-7 ft.)
- 4 feet tall

● Colocasia White Lava (matures at 3 ft.)
> 3 feet tall
> lots of leaves, thick at base, slender stems


PLAN TO OVERWINTER IN POTS
● Colocasia Blue Gecko (matures at 3 ft.)
> 1.5+ feet tall
> lots of leaves, slender stems

● Colocasia Blue Hawaii (matures at 3-4 ft.)
> 3 feet tall
> lots of leaves, slender stems

● Colocasia Black Ruffles (matures at 4-6 ft.)
> 3 feet tall
> lots of leaves, slender stems

● Colocasia esculenta 'Mojito' (matures at 4-6 ft.)
> 3 feet tall, lots of leaves
> I read it cannot be stored dormant until after at least 3 seasons, to give the corms time to increase in size.

● Alocasia Lautervachiana (matures at 3 ft.)
> 1.5 feet tall
> My understanding is it can never be overwintered in dormant state.

Thanks for any advice you can provide!

It sounds like you have already done more research than I ever have on this, and I don't think I've ever had one rot or fail to rebound in spring.
If they have a nice corm/bulb, I think you're safe to dig, let dry, wrap in newspaper and store in a cardboard box in a warm ish location.
I have overwintered some in pots. I have an alocasia and, even stuck in a pot with leaves cut off, and NOT watered, and put in a cool dim place, refused to go dormant. It tried to start a new leaf.

I have had Colocasia black Magic/Black Runner..also crammed in a small pot, small amount of soil, leaves tied to a stick, rebounded like crazy in spring.

One problem I had was a small Colocasia Black I tried keeping as a normal potted plant. Got terrible spider mites.

I think they are all very vigorous plants and hard to kill. Keep on the dry side, I think they slow way down. Kept moist, I think better provide plenty of light.

My two cents.

sallyg: Thank you for the response. You are confirming what I have read elsewhere, in that the plants go semi-dormant even when overwintering them as potted plants – and they need very little water during that time. I have also read about the spider mite problem for indoor potted EE's. Not looking forward to that.

I continued to dig for more information after my post and found that Blue Hawaii should have a tuber that can be stored in a dormant state. And because Mojito has such tall and leggy leaves, I will probably try and store it dormant as well – even if the corms are very small.

That leaves me with (3) to overwinter as active plants: Colocasia Black Ruffles, Colocasia Electric Blue Gecko and Alocasia Lautervachiana. If I find a decent sized corm when I dig them up, my plans will change. I've found so much conflicting information, it's hard to make sense of it all. Much like storing other types of bulbs, people have success in a variety of ways, with some having more success than others. The differences between the many varieties of Alocasia's and Colocasisa's makes overwintering even more interesting.

Thanks again for sharing your experience. For the Black Magic you had crammed into a small pot, did you water it at all over the winter, or did you simply pot it and forget it?

Not sure but guessing I dribbled a little water in. It sat elevated from the concrete floor, in the utility room, by a west facing window.
The reason I wrote it with /Runner, is that I've read many may be mislabeled. The black one I grew in a very moist place had runners like crazy, up to six feet long.

users coleup and HollyAnn on Midatlantic Forum have more experience with this than I do. You could ask here
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/f/region_mida/all/

Black Ruffles was derived from Black Magic and my Ruffles also sent out quite a few runners over the Summer, some of which I allowed to root. I plan on putting several rootings in a pot for the Winter - jut to see what happens to them.

I just checked the mid-atlantic forum you provided the link for. I didn't know that particular forum existed, and it contains a wealth of information. Thank you very much.

And - geez, sally! I read some of your old posts. With the # of plants you tend to you are obviously a master gardener, and apparently living on a very large farm! I'm jealous.

Here is a sticky on storing EE's for winter that I need to go through one of these days.

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/773186/

I do find spider mites are common in winter on EE's if I keep the bulbs under lights and try to keep them growing. Sometimes I wonder if it is best to just let them go dormant for winter as I did last year on my two largest containers (22 inch and 20 inch tucked away in a storage room in the basement with no lights and no water). These two containers had an assortment of Alocasia and Colocasia in them. The smaller pots under lights had mixed results - some rotted and some came through in fairly good shape.

hcmcdole - Thank you very, very much for providing that link. Also, many thanks to rox_male for compiling those links. There's a lot of very good information there!

In my own (weak) defense I did perform several searches in DG before posting my questions but failed to come up with any of the threads in rox_male's post. Obviously, my search queries were inadequate ...

After what seems to be way too much online research I've decided to:

▪ place C. Black Ruffles and C. Electric Blue Gecko in the basement, still potted as you have described.
▪ keep C. Mojito alive in a semi-dormant condition in a north facing window.
▪ keep A. Lautervachiana as a houseplant, as I've only seen one post (elsewhere) concerning overwintering it - stating it will die if you try and force it to go dormant. Besides, it's very slow growing so forcing it to push out a whole new set of leaves next Spring seems way too optimistic. In this whole growing season, it 'may' have put out five new leaves - even though it's very healthy. And it does make an attractive houseplant, assuming it keeps all of its leaves.
▪ The rest will be stored in peat tubs in my attic which has been ideal for storing amaryllis, tulips, canna's, caladium and gladiola's.

Thanks for all the information!

If I'm lucky I won't have to buy new three inch plants next Spring ...

Best of luck to you, GardeningVA. If you started with three inch (tiny!) plants this year, NEXT year may blow you away. I had a couple OK years with my black EE but when I finally grew it right in the ground, with plenty of moisture, it amazed me!

Thank you sallyg: Yes, they were all only three inches tall when received from Wellspring. All were delivered healthy and in good physical condition, so I would definitely buy from them again.

I probably won't plant any of them in the ground as I have two very large and mature deciduous trees (white oak and beech) directly adjacent to my small yard that invade my beds with mats of roots that suck up every bit of moisture out of the ground. It's quite amazing.

Black Ruffles and Mojito were a bit disappointing this year. Both flopped over in late Spring and I've had to prop them up ever since - although they were otherwise very healthy. That issue could be due to a number of things - under-watering, under-fertilizing, fast growth, and possibly planting them too shallow. (Whatever - I'm sure it's my fault, and not due to the incredibly destructive gray squirrels in the neighborhood that insist upon climbing on, chewing on and digging in every square inch of my back yard.) Perhaps the second growing season for the ears will see thicker and more hardy stems so they won't flop. I'm also anxious to see how A. portora and A. calidora develop next year.

Oh no. I'm already planning for next year ...

I found that Mojito likes to keep its feet wet, fertilized, and lots of sun. I bought small plants from Wellspring too plus some from Florida Hill Nursery.

Nancyana took off this year and is a lot larger than Mojito on both sides of Nancy's Revenge. These are all in their own one gallon pots and then the pots are in a large aluminum pan that is usually kept full of water.

Nice!
Here is how my two will spend winter. Black EE Colocasia crammed in the two gal ? Pot. In basement. And Alocasia odora.? Will stay in that pot. It was one leaf this spring having survived some time in office. It had a big brother so it will be bigger next year.

hcmcdole, Nice picture of some healthy plants. A while back, after it flopped, I did read that you can't give Mojito too much water. Mosquitoes are a big problem in my area, so placing pots in saucers of standing water is not an option for me. It's still a good idea so I may have to think about a solution over the Winter.

Sallyg, will you then let them go dry and dormant until Spring? Or will you dribble just enough water on them to keep several leaves alive?

The large, upright leaves of the odora always capture my attention. Yours has a brown trunk forming, which I assume means it's several years old. How many seasons does it take to form that trunk?

Hi GardeningVA, I get those mosquito dunks at HD/Walmart and break them into chunks and toss them in each pan of water. It won't get all the mosquitoes (there are too many sources of water here) but it will cut down on a bunch of them.

I kept my Mojitos, Nancyana, Elena in trays of water. The other pots were watered nearly every day (Elepaio, Black Coral, and other pots with Colocasia). I find the Alocasias can dry out some and prefer it that way but the Colocasias are weeping if I don't keep them wet.

A few of the pots from 2014. I think I need to thin out some of my pots next year.

those are fabulous!
well, except for the last one, those bat wing shapes are too weird for me!

Wow. Those are amazing pictures. I can only hope mine will look half as good next year. I'm convinced; Next year I'll be using saucers and dunks! I agree the plant in the last picture is very strange looking, although also very healthy. Each leaf has a tail!

That last one is 'Stingray'. It is such an oddity that it just had to be in my collection. Bought my first two when I was at a begonia convention in Palm Beach 2009. Lost those (overwatering in winter) so I bought another one a year or two later and babied it for a while. Now I seem to have dozens of babies.

Here are a few more of it (some mine, some at a nursery or a Florida attraction). Well I could only find a few (second photo) at Discovery Cove (Orlando) but I know I have seen it at more FL attractions - guess I need to start naming all my photos.

Very interesting. I'll add stingray to my list of future additions, but I first need to see if I can overwinter the ones I have. Thanks!