Gardendaze

As I continue to bring my houseplants indoors, I started to wonder about this one, Birkin.

I’ve had it about 2 years now and I am beginning to wonder about it. I have a couple of choices: my favorite choice is always the easiest–just turn it into compost. Life is too short to put up with bad plants inside or out. (Remember, I am the one who famously composted everybody’s darling philodendron ‘Pink Princess’ when it got too ungainly).

I could also try to divide it. I think–based on its growth habit–that it’s sort of crying out to be divided. But I am not sure about that, and the last thing I want are two ugly philodendron lying around. We’ll see.

Then there’s this. See this cute little plant at the base? That’s the plant that Birkin sported from, so to speak. That’s philodendron Rojo Congo (sometimes sold as Red Congo).

Here’s last year’s version, happily growing after I scissored it off and gave it its own pot. Birkin is really a 2-fer plant because it seems that it almost always attempts to revert in this manner. You need to catch it and prune out the reversions before they take over the main plant. As a nifty bonus, you get a second plant–if you want one.

But that doesn’t tell me what to do with my ungainly Birkin. Some folks say “moss pole.” I am not going there. I will leave it be for the winter (since this is not an optimal propagating time) and see what I think come springtime–if I can stand to look at this for this long!