My ZZ plant, Zamioculcas zamiifolia, has a wee new sprout, like a bonzai ZZ, and a couple of other sprouts with just two leaves so far. I've had it for three or four years, don't remember that it flowered. There's not much to this plant - all the leaves turned yellow last year (well, there were only four leaves); now it still has four leaves, two yellow and two new ones that look good. I'm just wondering if the new sprouts are what baby ZZs look like (photos I'm seeing of new plants show close to regular sized leaves), since the new shoots have always come up from the main plant, as full-size leaves. This would be from a seed, or would an offshoot of the parent plant look like this?
I don't know what it is, but doubt it's a baby ZZ. It doesn't have the same leaf type. It does however look interesting and unlike common weeds in some potting soils.
I now think it is a baby ZZ. I passed some for sale at a corner store near me that have shoots twice the size, but still have the slender stems, with a sheath around the bottom of the stem as on mine. The new leaflets on mine are similar to those on the old leaves, including what looks like a spiny tip that is actually more like a soft hair. The reason this was so confusing to me was that usually, even in photos, we see the new shoots on fat stems, as in this photo. Toxic Plants & Fungi Never mind the "toxic" part of that link name; it's not likely poisonous. There is a lot of into at http://www.exoticrainforest.com/Zamioculcas zamiifolia pc.html I finally found one photo of a shoot from leaf cuttings that shows similar stems, though not the tight cluster of new leaflets as on mine. I had a lot of fallen leaflets on the soil. Maybe some reproduced themselves. http://indoor-plants.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Leaf-cuttings.jpg
Well, this is exciting! I had heard that they can grow from a single leaf, somewhere in Internetopolis. Probably a chanced upon blog. Anyhow, now that I know what it is, I can see a what I think would be called a cataphyll, that eventually papery part that shields the new growth. I was expecting, as I think you were, a more substantial thicker leaf for even a new erupted plant. Are you going to leave it there or repot it now or eventually?
The larger plant is (well, looks like two plants are) so sparse, I'm just going to leave the new growth and let them fight it out. I don't have room for or interest in having new plants.
This is off topic, but it's my thread, so here are photos of my ZZ plant's flowers, or the two spathes anyway. The baby plant that started this thread doesn't seem to have grown much, but I'm still not interested in moving it. And I see I have two cotyledons. It will be apartment living for the plants in this pot. I have five leaves now, but one is starting to turn yellow. I read that it doesn't like too much water, but mine didn't seem to like being dry. Now I've just read that it would like dry winters, more water in summer.
Here is a garden planting of ZZ plants at a commercial building in Honolulu, and it's clear that some new shoots start big and fat, and some start skinny and small. I guess I could dig mine up to learn how they differ underground, but I'm not so inclined. If I remember correctly, my plant at home has at least six leaves now. The small ones have barely grown at all.
Just a guess here, but I'm thinking the stout sprouts are rhizomatous offshoots, while the more petite shoots are coming off a smaller energy source. Sort of like, big amaryllis bulb vs offset bulblet.
Thanks for the comment, @thanrose. Maybe the small ones come from the runners instead of the rhizomes. Or maybe they are even seedlings? This Wikipedia article, Monocotyledon - Wikipedia, mentions that monocots develop runners that can bear "scale leaves", which are smaller leaves. I haven't been able to track down whether these smaller leaves are an example of that or not.
Here are a few pictures of one I’ve had for a couple years. It was only a bit wider than its container when I bought it. The widest part is now a little more than a meter; it’s wider than the wall it’s up against. The stalks grow longer but I haven’t seen evidence of new leaves forming. As was pointed out before, you can see in the pics that the stalks come in a variety of lengths. There are short ones with leaves out and there are tall ones that have yet to unfurl. There is also variety in the stalk girth that isn’t necessarily in proportion to the height. Long story short, that sprout may very well be a new stalk. They are a rhizome, meaning the roots branch out underground and sprout new stalks as it spreads. It’s an evergreen succulent. It will lose leaves if unwatered for too long (a loooong time for this plant), and in more extreme cases, the stalks die and shrink from tip down making them look like used taper candles. It is very resilient to abuse, can survive in very little light so they are great for dark corners in your house, and they are virtually impossible to kill so it’s great for people with brown thumbs. The roots survive even if all the stalks die. I hope this was a little helpful. Cheers! PS. The lighting is weird in my pictures so they have a pink cast. The leaves are a rich green with some variation in brightness throughout the plant. There are some less common cultivars that have different coloring.
Thanks, @Stephanie Meyer. Here's mine, photo just now, taken at night, five years after the photos above. I think this is the same pot, same soil. It has 8 stems now, more than it's ever had all at once, plus one new skinny shoot. And one mostly dead stem. Leaves are getting shorter. I'm sure I should repot it, but since it's doing better than ever, I'm not motivated. I think the skinny stems did eventually grow up. I spent two winter months in Hawai'i during three of the years since the original posting, and it always looked a little better when I returned, after my neighbour was taking care of it. But the last two years year I was only gone for three weeks, and someone else might have watered it once. I can't remember if I said to not water it. This year, I think I'm watering it every three weeks or so, when I can tip the pot easily with one hand.
Yes, I realized after posting that you posted in 2018, so your mystery may had been well solved by now. But I just wanted to add to the comments in case anything was helpful to anyone whenever, you or otherwise. Was that sprout indeed part of the plant, and if so, do you know roughly how big it got? Just curious. I found this thread at the top of a google search pertaining to another aspect of leaf growth. Thought I’d just share a bit of what I know and could take pictures of.
