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Variegated Plants - Charm and Challenges · Hydroponics Daily

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  Hello and welcome back to Hydroponics Daily, the podcast where modern cultivation
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  meets science and sustainability.
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  I'm Dr. Russell Sharp, the inventor of gold leaf fertilizer,
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  or as it's called in the UK, liquid gold.
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  And today we're talking about something quite golden.
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  We're talking about variegation, the sort of lush, streaky, speckled growth
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  you get on leaves that it's not green.
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  It could be white, could be yellow, could be golden. This is called variegation.
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  Some people call it albino growth but it's variegation
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  is what most people call it so they
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  many people want variegated plants
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  because they are collectible they are interesting to look at some people consider
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  them vulgar and in sort of like gardening outdoor gardening many variegated
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  plants are shunned because they're considered a bit tacky whereas in house plants now since covid.
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  Variegated forms are very expensive we've got a variegated swiss
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  cheese plant monstera deliciosa in our
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  office and it's you know we could sell it for hundreds of
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  pounds because it's so rare and variegated form and
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  so it's it's it's a really interesting topic
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  it's of interest in many different sectors of hydroponics
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  especially ornamental plants in plants that
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  are grown for food normally variegation is not
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  wanted because all of the variegated tissue that
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  doesn't isn't green is not photosynthesizing and
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  so it's wasted plant material and so you'll get far lower photosynthetic rates
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  in variegated plants we have a standard what we call in science wild type monster
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  a plant in the office and that grows a lot faster than the variegated form so and,
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  this also suffers a lot less stress.
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  So if you're growing a crop that doesn't rely on it being variegated,
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  best to avoid variegated forms.
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  They can be unusual, interesting to look at, but they're not gonna grow anywhere near as fast.
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  So we're going to look at all the different causes of variegation,
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  see if they're stable and how you can propagate these plants,
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  because if they can be very expensive, then they can be propagated.
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  So as we said, the Monstro Deliciosa was a very expensive form.
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  There's also more common varieties that are less looked upon as being hip and
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  in at the moment, like spider plant.
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  Spider plant is not. you can command hundreds of
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  pounds for a spider plant and in fact many if you
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  if you look at a spider plant and you've been in horticulture for a
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  while it's reminiscent of like 1970s houses
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  and old sort of horticultural books from
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  back then an interesting side note spider plant
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  is it's got the world's worst latin name
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  or scientific name its genus is chlorophytum
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  which means green leaf which is hardly unusual
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  for plants and also it doesn't have green leaves it
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  has variegated leaves i think i've said this before so stupid plant
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  really other variegated plants that i really like
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  are dawn redwood you can get completely albino
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  versions of dawn redwood so there's a thing that might be like a developmental
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  mistake or even a mutation and they can sprout up and they live solely on the
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  energy supplied by the mother plant and they can grow up to like 12 meters tall
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  I'm told anyone in sort of Humboldt County,
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  any Northern Californian growers have ever seen a albino redwood,
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  I'd love to see a picture of it because they sound amazing.
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  Like imagine an albino Christmas tree, you know, completely white.
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  That would be really cool.
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  So no green material at all, whereas variegation, normally there's some green material.
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  So what is variegation and why is it happening it's
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  obviously difference in colors between the plant foliage the
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  key factor is chlorophyll so it may
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  be that they lack all pigments altogether in
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  which case they'll be white or pink white or pink white or
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  cream and then there might be other when the chlorophyll
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  disappears there might be other underlying pigments so
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  there might be orange or purples coming through it can
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  be caused by genetic variation variation just
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  so genetic mutation so in the
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  dna of the plants and that can and that can be
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  passed through to the seeds so they so these tend
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  to show consistency in the patterns across generations so
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  spider plant would be a good example of that calanthia is
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  another good example lots of calanthias they're a
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  tropical house plant that come from the
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  amazon rainforest coleus hybrids another
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  very common house plant plants in legal cannabis true stable genetic variegation
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  is very very rare and generally it's bred out due to the reduced photosynthesis
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  it's not it's not a um one that improves yield however if you could produce a plant that had.
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  With variegated buds but not
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  leaves then you would probably be onto a massive massive
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  winner because you would need
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  far less curing because there's no chlorophyll you know people smoke cannabis
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  legal cannabis and the the harshness comes from the chlorophyll not from any
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  of the chemicals in it so if you could produce a bud that was variegated only
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  in the only in the bud and not in the leaves, you'd be onto a winner.
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  So very hard to inbreed that plant though, because it's dioecious,
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  produces male and female plants, whereas other plants it is.
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  And a mutation as well, when it's due to a single mutation, it's very hard to
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  breed that mutation in and keep it stable.
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  Normally the wild type shows up in the progeny, the daughter plants.
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  You can get something called chimeral variegation, and we're going to talk about
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  chimeras in another episode,
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  because they're really really interesting they're one of the most interesting
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  things about plant science in my opinion and if
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  you know what chimera is it's like a two separate
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  organisms that their cells have been intertwined
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  together so don't think of chimeras if you look it up you might see something
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  about ancient greek gods or monsters where there's like half a horse and half
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  a lion or something like that this is this is very different this is where the
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  cells of two completely different organisms intertwine.
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  So you might have two cell lines of the same plant intertwined,
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  and so you have the albino version and the wild-type green version,
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  and together they produce a variegated plant.
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  So those distinct cells, genetic distinct cells, are living side by side,
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  and that can lead to dramatic stripes or splits in colours on the leaves.
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  Think of white and green.
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  Pophos or monstras apparently are due to chimerial variegation.
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  Propagation tip, chimerial variegation can be maintained by cuttings, but not by seed,
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  because obviously it's only one type of genetic line can come through in the
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  seed because the pollen is transferring single pollen cells and chromosomes
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  through to the mother plant.
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  So chimeras, they are purely by cuttings, so they won't preserve the pattern.
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  There's viral variegation caused by infection, these are usually not desirable.
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  You'll see mosaic or mottled patterns, yellow-green patterns.
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  But you get them, they come along with stunted growth because it's a virus and weak plants.
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  If any of your plants start to show symptoms of viruses, best isolate and then
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  discard, burn them, you know, to prevent the spread. Just get rid of them, really.
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  Viral variegation was also very common in tulips. Before people knew what the
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  cause was and knew about genetics and how things were transferred.
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  You could actually, you know, in Holland during in tulip
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  mania they often viral variegations
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  were sold for a high premium and and
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  then you know the virus would would be would
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  either harm the tulips or would would grow
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  out and they would actually be cured of their virus variegation.
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  And stuff like that so very rare that a virus variegation
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  is is wanted but in in tulips it was actually seen as
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  a potential novel tulip and
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  then if you know anything about tulip mania you know it's a great example of
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  how like a market stock markets but all types
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  of markets can go boom and bust you know sort of beanie
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  babies you know the price for things skyrockets and
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  then as soon as they become in high demand the supply
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  starts to come back and the price drops dramatically and
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  crashes the tulip mania was a class is
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  the classic example and it's taught in all business
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  schools and the price of one tulip bulb
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  sold for the same amount as one house in amsterdam that's
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  sort of crazy levels fourth type of
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  variegation environmental or nutritional variegation temporary
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  or stress-induced deficiency that magnesium or iron might
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  cause intervenal chlorosis too much light
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  can bleach certain leaves so they're not
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  true variegation and then there is another type of variegation i
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  once read about where it's it's actually the plants look like
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  they've got no chlorophyll but it's because the light's being reflected back
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  from the leaves so like silvery leaves can look variegated because the light's
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  coming back because um plants in like on on sand dunes and places like that.
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  Where they receive extremely high light levels actually don't want all the lights
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  they bounce a bit back and it.
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  So we said it can show, often it's shown up as genetics or environmental stress.
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  Reduce that growth, slower growth, lower yields, can look cool,
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  but it's not a phenotype you're normally looking for.
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  How do you care for variegated plants if it is something that you're looking
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  for? Well, the light is critical.
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  And one thing you won't see often is watering is critical because the light,
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  the leaf temperature and the water all play in together to each other.
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  And the leaf temperature rises too much, they'll scorch really, really easily.
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  Far, far easier than a green leaf will scorch because when plants are photosynthesized,
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  they're mopping up the light and the damage that that light does inside the cells.
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  And if you don't have the chlorophyll there to mop up all these things called
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  free radicals, these molecules that sort of cause damage, like in humans it cause cancer,
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  if you don't have the antioxidizing ability of photosynthesis,
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  then you're going to cause so much damage that the cells
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  will die when the cells die that will on a
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  large scale that scorch so light levels
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  need to be kept low watering needs to be kept well
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  really you know good water in your grow
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  media because if as soon as you produce watering the
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  stomata close and the leaf temperature rises up and again high temperatures
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  that's going to cause scorch again so that's really critical because variegated
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  plants you can't sell a scorched plant so you might have the most wonderful
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  variegated plant but it was scotch and then philodendron they're related to
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  monsters they're all in the same.
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  Family if you don't give them enough light they'll
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  actually go from variegated back to green because they
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  need to they they sort of revert to full
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  green so it's a delicate balancing act
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  that's one of the reasons they command such high price because no idiot can
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  do it you have to be have at least some knowledge you have to be able to you
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  know feed yourself to do this you have to be able to study and get your environment
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  dialed in so plants can revert back to green if you don't give them enough light
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  and they will scorch if you give them too much.
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  Nutrients need to be kept consistent, especially magnesium and nitrogen.
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  Pruning, if your variegated plant starts reverting, growing full green leaves,
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  you prune those off and encourage the variegated form.
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  You see this a lot on trees, variegated trees, don't look the best variegated
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  trees but some people like them, variegated maples,
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  people who haven't cut off the reverted material
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  and so you get a tree that looks half variegated half not and then cloning so
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  making sure if you're going to if it is a variegation that's non-genetic it's
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  a chimera or something that's not going to be stable when in the seed then make
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  sure you take clones cuttings layering things like that so closing thoughts,
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  variegation adds a dash of surprise and beauty especially in
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  hydroponics where there's often not much in the way of color but
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  it does add complexity so if you're a collector looking for
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  a clone to you know wow your
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  fellow growers then um can certainly be something you
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  can have in your in your garden
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  your grow room and people will take notes and think
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  that you're a great grower if you're able to create these
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  and propagate them and even sell them so
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  that's been hydroponics daily for today hopefully a helpful episode about variegation
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  if you stay tuned about the chimeras because there's some really amazing examples
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  of chimeras that are not about variegation and yeah you wouldn't hard to believe
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  how these how some of these chimeras.
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  Created so variegation thank you very much for listening if you found it interesting
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  please give it a review on whatever podcast platform you listen to okay now
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  you can go and listen to someone far more professional than me talk about something
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  probably far less interesting than variegation Thank you very much. Goodbye.