The Dinosaur Plant Rises Again

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Here on the Texas coast we have a lot of tropical foliage. In spite of our semi-arid climate (and a devastating ongoing drought), our humid atmosphere and generally mild winters allow many tropical plants to thrive. We have one such tropical in our front yard. We affectionately call it the Dinosaur Plant. We imagine it in some prehistoric landscape with its giant leaves being nibbled for dinosaur elevenses. Here it is a few years ago, with some tiny Sonars:

Then, the dinosaur plant was larger than our van, with its giant hand-like leaves forming an umbrella that wee people could tunnel under for a good hide-and-seek spot. The weight of its soft, leaning trunks eventually caused it to tip over in great loops. So we gave it a dramatic haircut a couple of years ago. 

The leaves filled-in very quickly, faster perhaps, because we’d made more room for them to grow. Last Halloween, a fuller-bodied version of the Dinosaur Plant supervised our graveyard.

I suppose it’s some kind of philodendron or something. I’m no plant expert. As I mentioned, our winters are mild. For the past several years, our coldest winter weather involved two hours at the freezing point, in the middle of one or two nights during the entire winter. The barest threat of freezing temperatures incites a fury of linen spread in front yards by tropical plant lovers. Bushes wrapped in quilts and bedsheets, some with extension cords strung for electric blankets.

The Dinosaur Plant has a fair amount of mass, and so we have never worried about a dalliance with freezing temperatures. No blanket has ever swathed those giant leaves, electric or otherwise. Oh sure, the tips of her fingers were sometimes a little frost-bitten, but nothing very serious.

This winter was a bit different. We had a week of subzero temperatures, with blisteringly cold windchills, topped off with an ice storm that shut down the entire Coastal Bend of Texas for a couple of days. Exciting stuff. Many people in the area had never experienced an ice storm. Corpus Christi’s landmark Harbor Bridge was coated in a fine sheet of ice, impassable for more than a day, not because of ice on the road, but because of the giant chunks of ice falling from the superstructure. Tropical plants withered up and died left and right. The Dinosaur Plant sustained heavy damage. When the trunks thawed, they turned a bit mushy. We were forced to cut her back to ground level and wonder if she’d grow back.

She did. 

Hope springs eternal.

Comments

[Cass]

Hurrah for the Dinosaur Plant! I would have been very sad indeed if she'd not survived. Grow grow grow... :)

[Victoria]

Oh-ho, what a sweet little picture, the dinosaur plant that could!

[Eglentyne]

We had a bit of a bare spot there for a few weeks. Then one night... BAM! No, not Emeril, just leafy shoots. :)