I'm absolutely useless when it comes to gardening:rolleyes: I have a cordyline plant in a large tub which Harvey has had great fun playing tug of war with! It was looking really tatty around the bottom as all the leaves had split so I've just given it a mega hair cut :-D I got a bit carried away and it now looks like palm tree My question is will it live now that I've cut all the bottom leaves away? I hope so because it looks really nice and as long as its not going to die off, I'm going to go and buy a nice trendy new planter to put it in Oh, one more question, why do the tips of the leaves go brown and can I snip those bits off or will I make it worse?

Thanks

Hayley

I think it will survive Hayley :), most of these plants lose leaves naturally from the bottom anyway.  Give it a while though before you invest in the new planter - give it a chance to get over the shock before you repot it!! :D  Think it is also common for the edges of leaves to go brown and no it shouldn't hurt to snip them off.

Thanks Annie, do you know if it's ok to keep them in pots or should they go into the ground? The roots are visible in the compost and it is in a big tub. The plant is about 2ft tall?

I'm certainly no expert on cordylines Hayley but I had heard they do better in pots than in the ground.  Eventually, you might have to plant it out though.

I have a cordyline planted at the back of my waterfall it has grown from approx 18ins and is now around 5ft tall it is planted in soil but not in the ground man made but not potted if you know what I mean. I think the only difference in potted and ground is the more room the roots have the bigger the plant will grow.
Dont think it will do any harm to take away the lower leaves.

HTH

Roni

Too much salt in your water can turn the tips of some leaves brown. I just snip them off but if I want a plant to look perfect, like a palm in the house, I water with distilled (ooh, that's the Californian in me, we have rain here!) They're pretty hard to kill. It should be fine, as mentioned those bottom leaves drop off as it gets taller anyway.

Hi There

My cordyline is exactly the same, I was worried about the leaves expecially as I had just replanted it into a bigger pot,  so I spoke to someone at a garden centre yesterday who said that you should remove all the lower dead leaves to expose the "Trunk" and yes it will grow to look like a palm.  He said it will grow fine in a pot but they do prefer to grow in the ground where they grow to about 18ft !! He then showed me a full grown one in all its glory. I have 2 a green and a dark red one, the red leaves were changing to a brownish colour I thought that its days were numbered by looking at it, but I was told that is quite normal, although apparently the red ones are slightly less hardy so try not to expose them to strong winds.

I have a cordalyne tree I have grown from a plant, it's about 12 feet tall or more now. Very early last year it flowered and since then has developed 4 branches. Today while I was removing dead leaves, I noticed it is suffering from an infestation. I'm not sure what type but there was a white spider among the leaves of one branch and the leaves are dying I think. I love this tree so any help or advice on pesticides or whatever will clear pests would be gratefully received as I have had this tree as long as I have been in my house and don't want to lose it...Thank you
Glenys