Hi everyone, My first post and I hope I'm not breaking any etiquette. OK, make a long story short, my mom had this plant at her house for about 4 years and then when I bought my new place, she gave me this plant and it has been another 4 years since. Recently, I noticed that this plant started flowering. I called my mom to find out if they ever flower before and she said never and that this is extremely extremely rare. She gave me the name in chinese but I had no clue what that meant. In any case, the flowers seem to bloom only at night but during the day they close into buds. It's very very fragrant in the evening. I feel bad for neglecting it a bit since it's a bit dried and I just recently changed it to a bigger pot. http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3383/3544381023_4cd8db60e1_b.jpg http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2425/3544377501_a908ea5c12.jpg http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3543/3545171066_24eb645820_b.jpg
Dracaena fragrans. They only flower when mature, which yours is now. It may start flowering more frequently in the future.
Thanks Michael. That was super quick. A follow up question... Do you know if this is toxic? Scent and the sappy clear discharge? I have little ones around the house, though I make sure they stay away from touching it but just out of curiosity. I'll try my luck on the web also, wikipedia did not have much. Again.. many thanks
Interesting. Do all Dracaena bloom, my husband had a variety of Dracaena, not sure which kind, and it never bloomed, just got so tall we had to cut it and wait for another sprout, eventually it got damaged in a move and never re-grew. At least I think it was a Dracaena, it looks very similar to dexterbot's photo.
I just did some search on the web and it does not have a lot of information on blooming. My mother told me this is an oddity but then again, she's not an expert. In our case, it's at least 8 years before we saw it bloom. It's extremely fragrant though and the odd thing, the flowers bloom at night and they close into buds during the day.
Some have reported their tree dying after flowering. Puts a strain on the plant or something? Who knows, I would just cut them off, but I've also never actually had one flower, so I could be completely wrong.
