A Gardeners Forum Forums General Discussion The House Plant Forum Poinsettia question

I get bought a poinsettia each Christmas, and usually they die within a fortnight, but last year I managed to keep my poinsettia, and have been nursing it all year. Suddenly it's leaves have started going red which I am overjoyed with, but I'm not sure how I've done it

I recently moved it into a darker room, but otherwise haven't done anything differently. Do they change colour due to the time of year, or is it likely to be due to the environment??

Also it is now very leggy, please could anyone give me some advice about the best time/way to prune it so that it gets bushy again? (always assuming that I don't kill it first)

thanks. I'm going to try and upload a photo of it - fingers crossed.

ah pic didn't work, will try again

that's really cool you kept it alive and the leaves are changing for you! I had one for years and mine died last year. I had it outside and it got covered with ants just before the first freeze. I couldn't bring it in.
anyway, from what I remember poinsettias need 12 hours light and 12 hours darkness. I almost killed mine several times trying to accomplish this by covering it up or moving it. one year, the leaves did turn red. I found out it had more to do with the cooler weather that year than it did with the lighting. maybe your weather has been cooler this year? btw, it looks like it could use a bigger pot.
I would think pruning it, or taking cuttings would be about the same as any other plant, but I'd wait till it's done with the color change. it is SO beautiful! What a great accomplishment!

cricket has it right. the final thing is if you can go into your photobucket and resize your picture to 640x480. that is the size limit we have here because it works best for all our members, even those with dial-up service.

thanks!

Ah thanks Cricket, yes you are right it does need a bigger pot, I hadn't realised. I will wait until after Christmas and re-pot it and have a go at pruning - eek, I'm not very good at it!

Sorry Jiffymouse, I didn't know there was a size limit, although I did think that it looked rather big. I'll have a go at resizing the pic.

Well, I'm not very good with 'pruning' either. frankly, that word intimidates me! ha ha. think of it as 'cutting it back', or 'trimming it'.
make your cut just above where a leaf comes out, with sharp sizzors. you can't go wrong. just remember cutting it will shock it just a bit, so try not to change any thing else for a week or so after it's been cut. might as well, try some cuttings while your at it? take the part you cut off, and make another cut just below the last leaf, and keep the soil moist till it roots.
good luck.
and again...beautiful!

I've resized, but the edit option in my post has disappeared, is there any way I can either remove or replace the pic? Sorry to be a pain.

Poinsettias (like Christmas cactus, cymbidiums, phalenopsis, etc.) will bloom in the winter. To trigger them to bloom, you have to expose them to low temperatures, and/or give them complete darkness (can't remember how long, but it think it was about 14hrs) to make them think it's winter. Most people don't know about their winter bloom and are surprised they they never bloom for them the next year. A lot of people don't bother with the temperature/darkness and just throw them out.

The red 'flowers' are not really flowers. They are bracts. If you look carefully, the flowers are the tiny yellow things in the middle

if you resized in photobucket it should automatically update. if you uploaded a resized photo to a new file, pm me the link and i'll do the edit for you. we don't allow member edits after a certain period of time. and thank you for understanding

Prune around March, as far back as you'd like. You can make MORE plants by taking 3-4 inch pruned off pieces and sticking them in moist potting soil.

The room you kept the plant in must have been dark enough to trigger bract coloring! Congrats!

http://www.thegardenhelper.com/poinsettias.htm

http://www.thegardenhelper.com/poinsettiaoutdoors.html