Hi there. I have this about nine variegated Bikkietiae. Out of the lot, there is this particular one – it's the largest one I have with very strong and consistent variegation.
There is something funny about this plant though compared to the others. All my others will make a new leaf and it will show bright yellow within two weeks. This particular plant will stay green for mobths (3-4 months) and then only turn yellow on green. The plant is crazy healthy, the leaves are nearly 70cm long. It outgrows all my other Billies but just stays green on green.
I would not blame you for maybe saying it needs more light but there are eight other plants all the way around it. Is this maybe just a different phenotype? A somaclonal variation? Has anyone seen or worked with a Billie such as this before? Most new leaves unfurl blank and then the variegation will build slowly (not completely blank but very feint, and will get super rich over time. Check last pic for new leaf where variegation is still feint). The leaves in the second photo are old leaves, you can see the size difference and the smaller one is only just starting to think about yellowing up. Thoughts?
All help and input greatly appreciated. I'm very new to Reddit so please do share around. 🙏🏽 Thank you.
by PaySenior2920
3 Comments
It’s seems that it is an aurea variagtion
The bigger the leaf. The longer the hardening off process. And the color too.
As plants mature the var changes a bit. For example my albo frydek now comes in almost aurea before fading to white. And alocasia pink nobillis becomes less pink as it matures (unless you got the special more expensive line). And there are persimmon princess lines out there that take an extremely long time to fade to green.
So this could be a maturity/specific characteristic of this particular plant type thing. The easiest way to establish this as it’s own unique specimen would be to chop and see if offspring also have the same behavior. And to make sure it’s not a light issue, you can lend/sell/whatever one to a friend to see if this color stays consistent in another environment. Or just move it to higher or lower light.