It's (dracaena) suffering from a heavy hand on the watering can, and likely the soil is high in salts. It looks like it's in coir or CHCs which are often high in salts from the get-go. I would do an emergency repot, removing all soil and repotting into a faster mixture & offer it good light and temps >60-65* - then hope. Water only when the soil feels dry at the drain hole.

Al

I'd do all that Al suggested. But if it were my plant, I'd also prune the main stem down to just below where it got narrow (the narrow spot just above the top of that new shoot.) You'll have the new shoot, plus the cut stem will probably produce a couple of new growing points well. The result will be a nice, fresh compact plant. You could also root the top as a cutting, but I wouldn't bother.

I'd wait to do that (the pruning) until a month or so from now. In my personal experience, I've found that the daylight in late February is strong enough, and lasts long enough, that pruning then gets good results.

Its full name is Dracaena deremensis 'Warneckii'

Karen's idea presents another way of approaching the problem that I hadn't considered because I made the assumption you were attached to the entire plant. Actually, what she suggested is what I would do, too. (I'm not jumping on the bandwagon - just reinforcing another's good idea.) I wouldn't waste a whole bunch of time trying to revitalize the main plant - it's pretty lanky already anyway.

Her suggestion on the timing could prove to be right on target; but, if after repotting you don't see a fair amount of new growth or extension of the existing growth in a month, I'd wait a little while longer before doing the stem pruning. Your tree will be low on energy reserves & even the ratty looking growth will be sending photosynthate (food) to the roots. When you cut it off, you've removed 90% of the plant's ability to make food and you'll be depending on the plant's stored energy reserves, primarily in the roots.

What she suggested would sound radical to a lot of plant people, but it's a sound suggestion and you shouldn't be afraid to take her advice. Make sure you do the repot though.

Al

Thanks for all your ideas!
I will go to the hardware store tomorrow and get new dirt. What brand/type should I get?

If you'll invest a little study time, you can make your own decision.

Al

Here is a link that might be useful: C'mon - click me. I'll take you to some soil info!

Well Al, I don't know about plants or dirt or any of this, hence the reason I asked what to get from the people that do know.
When a question about a VW is posted on the forum I frequent, and I know the answer because of my experience, I don't tell the person to 'invest a little study time and make your own decision', I type the correct answer. Doing otherwise doesn't help the original poster or their situation, it only creates animosity.

Does anyone other than Al have some advice for me?

I agree with Al.

Reading that post that he linked for you has changed my whole growing experience.

Al was answering you question about what soil to get, by showing you a link with soil recipes that are far better than any soil that you buy in a bag.

My advice would be to take a few minutes and read that link about soils for containers. Your plants will thank you for it, by growing the best they can.

If that is not what you are looking for. Then go buy a bag of MG potting mix and watch your plant deteriorate, just as it is now.

Vega - Wow! - What a novel way of getting anyone who WAS interested in helping you to immediately divest themselves of that want. Lolol

I offered the advice with a smile - happy for the opportunity to do what I thought was a favor. I won't bother saying anything more, other than if you expect to be spoon-fed your information on these forums, a little charm wouldn't hurt - and you'll need to have at least a minimal level of mental acuity if you're to separate the wheat from all the chaff - so you're STILL going to have to study. ;o)

Good luck.

Al

Al is one of the most giving, kindnest and helpful members here on this web. Please don't look at him with animosity, I think he was just trying to steer you into the right direction. For you to read so you can remember and do what's best for you. Information retained has never hurt amyone.
I remember people in my life that showed me how to fix things instead of doing it for me,and in the end, now that I own my own home, I can save a lot of money fixing things myself, because people took the time to steer me in the right direction and told me to read instructions, by learning and not doing all things for me, the easy way out. My dad use to throw instructions before me, then say read, then assemble..lol
Information I read that has benefited me,such as on this forum, or such as making the BEST!!!!, and for me I mean the BEST soil for my once sickly plants, I will always carry with me in my mind.
If Miracle Grow or any of the potting bagged soil companies took the time to you what their soil did for your plants in a few weeks time, you would stay away from them. But they don't tell you the truth. They just want your money.
I was like you too vegasjetta, lost in the soil department, until Al cane along and showed me where to do my research on the best soils and how to make them.
Al and many others here know the answer to alot of things,even have secrets, but they would'nt have known them if they hadn't 'invest a little study time'in what they are so willing to share.
So pleae, no "animosity" or you might miss out on a great person here an miss out on very valuable info.
Thanks Al and all, for a showing us your posts and allowing us to choose for our selves what works for our plants..:-)
Al, please don't take what vegasjetta said personlly which you probably won't. I am just assuming that she is as frustrated as I was on her quest for the perfect soil and what works for her. She doesn't know you yet, nor your witty remarks and sometimes tasteful critism at times...lol
Mike

Mike- how come I run into to you all the time! Is this the Al you post about often??? I'm psyched, and Al- I WILL read your post, as I have heard such great things about your soil- less mixes! Now, finally, I may be able to get my plants places!

Hey jeelli,
:-)
Yes, this is the Al commonly known as "tapla". I have to give credit where do.;-)
I would of givin up on plants, since I would kill almost most, and yet since I joined this forum, and since I have learned from so many, especially from 'Al' tapla, in the soil department, My plants HAVE gone to many places except plant heaven or plant hell, since I met him. lol
Go to the Citrus forume, and tread the post'Finally oictures" from me. You will see what his soil idea has done for my use to be hard to grow plants...
He has even taken the time to even e-mail me and send me products at his expense. I love the guy for his willingness to share! I am not use to that form most people I know..
You will gain as much info as I have if you read the post.."Container Soils". It will change the way to grow plants in containers forever if you have gone what I have gone through and if you try it.
Your kind jeeli, and I enjoy your posts too...:-)
Stay happy, and always be a part of us...Mike

If I asked you "what type of upholstery to put on the seats of my passat?". You couldn't give a definite answer, because it is up to the owner to decide what's best for them. You could give them the pros and cons to different options, like leather or some other material. The owner would have to decide for themselves which type of upholstery they want.

There is no clear answer to your question about which soil to get.
If you ask this question in 10 different forums, you'll likely get 10 different answers.
In the end it's your decision on what you want to use.
Al's answer is clear to a lot of us here, because we've put it to use, and we see the difference in our plants.

Vegas, however someone asnwers a query in this journal should be taken as an attempt to set straight a question that might bear directly on the problem set out.

If this plant recovers, fine....great...but since how you made clear that you didn't know why the plant was doing what it was doing, then someone might think you are a novice in how to take care of houseplants.

This plant might kick the bucket in any case and if this plant is any kind of omen, you will repeat the miscaring with your next plant.
So, instead of finding fault with someone who gave you straight talk, I suggest you get yourself a book, any kind of book on houseplant care, so that you can avoid exactly what your question was about......"what did I do wrong"...
In "google", try asking a question about "how to water houseplants"....and so read "why", "what", "when", "where", and "how" to water.

Your plant was evidently in a bad way and you decided to kill it with kindness by drowning it. Take my word, drowning a plant is not the way to cure ills.

Vega...To save your Dracaeana, (and I truly believe your plant will do fine with a little care) you have a few options.
One is pruning the larger stalk. Do you see the baby/offshoot growing off the main trunk, soon more will sprout. Anyway, remove the larger stalk, cut into 4" sections. Each can be rooted in soil. When roots are 4-6", place back with mom. BTW, if you decide to prune mom, she'll grow and produce newer branches and leaves.

The second option is to peel/remove dead foliage. New growth will form on the upper trunk, but the bottom will remain bare. That is until baby's/offshoots fill in.
I'd go with option number one.

As to why this is happening. One reason could be dry air and/or dry soil.

Keep your plant away from a heating source. Or icy drafts. Where is it normally kept? In a window, center or corner room?

As for soil, most brands are okay, though some heavy soils need admending. Since your Dracaeana is fairly hardy, Miracle Gro works well.
Don't overpot. Pot should be 1- 1 1/2" wider than rootball. Water well..let soil dry a bit between waterings. Also, be sure pot has drainage holes.
A bright east window is sufficient.
Because Dracaenas prefer humidity, daily misting and/or weekly showering keeps leaves dust-free, and helps somewhat with humdity.
That's about it. Take care and good luck, Toni

I think both advice options A) prune the large stem B) peel/remove dead foliage, are very ill-conceived and probably rooted in the desire to make the plant pretty, rather than well.

Karen (and I) recognized the importance of keeping the photosynthetic (food-making) machinery intact for some time into the future because the plant is hanging by a thread. Removing more than 95% of the plants food making ability now is a huge gamble - perhaps a death sentence. In essence, you would be gambling that there is enough stored energy in the remaining plant tissues to supply the energy to grow the foliage it produces to about 75% mature so it is able to offer a return on the plant's energy outlay. That's NOT a good bet; and pruning now will NOT correct what has sent the plant into severe decline - it will exacerbate it.

I'm not sure why you would offer the advice you did, in the face of the reasoning I offered above, unless you've thought through it and would like to share your reasoning? Please?

Toni also said: "As to why this is happening. One reason could be dry air and/or dry soil."

While that is perfectly true, it is only ONE of at least a dozen possibilities. Dry air is NOT likely the primary cause - only a contributing factor if a factor at all. The odds are the primary cause is a drought response caused by high salt levels, under-watering, or over-watering.

I doubt you'll find anything reliable stating that misting houseplants is a benefit, but you'll find good studies pointing to the fact that misting can interfere with transpiration and photosynthesis, as well as spread diseases and pests from leaf to leaf and plant to plant.

Al

Hey Mike- I did see your post in the Citrus forum. Maybe I should have sent you my grapefruit tree- poor neglected thing is dying from a scale infestation. Shouldn't have put her in the basement! I've been spraying everyone else, but it's too late for the tree.
Out of frustration, I posted a question on the fragrant plant forum- not much of a response, but I think I know the answer anyway....
btw- your questions on Plumerias are also very educational to me; I've started to dabble with them, too.

Vegas,

There isn't any ONE correct answer, that's why you weren't given one. Attempts were made to help you; sadly they were not to your liking. Feel free to keep searching on your own, maybe you'll find better answers that way.

Well, er, removing dead foliage wouldn't affect photosynthesis, because dead foliage is dead and doesn't photosynthesize. Removing living foliage because part of the leaf is dead might be bad, but it wasn't necessarily what was being suggested, either.

Also, add me to the list of people who were kind of whomperjawed by vegasjetta's "just tell me the answer" response. Kids these days.

Lol - Chopping the main stem is pretty radical & would pretty much remove 95% of the foliage, yes? ;o)

When she said "peel/remove dead foliage. New growth will form on the upper trunk", she either meant to peel off the ratty leaves or was wrong about new growth forming on the upper trunk. Because it is physiologically consistent that new growth would appear after the leaves were removed (but not the dead parts trimmed) from a healthy plant growing robustly, I actually gave her the benefit of the doubt when I took her suggestion to say peal the leaves off the stem.

If she meant to say "Trim only the dead parts", wouldn't it have been advisable to say something like "Carefully trim away the brown parts only and leave the live portions to make food for the plant until it recovers?" so there would be no confusion?

I'm sorry, but it's another example of advice that makes absolutely no sense. What good is advice if you have to consider several "she might have meants" and after you do, are still left wondering at the crux?

It's very helpful to mention WHY we offer the advice we do. If we can't explain WHY, especially when asked, we're probably not being fair to people reading the advice. Meaning well and doing good are quite different. I'm very sure she meant well, but those intentions carried with them the very obvious potential to leave people misinformed and worse off than had the advice not been offered. Consider that: Would the plant be better off if the suggestions were adopted or ignored?

I HATE being the heavy, I know Toni is probably a good person, but I also have great difficulty with advice offered that is unsupportable by anything other than "she might have meants". I think I work fairly hard to share whatever what I know - I enjoy it - but misinformation is like the one step forward & two back thing.

There are a couple of people who post here regularly, and if you ask them WHY they said something or offered a piece of advice, especially when it hinges on something technical, there is never a reply because they do not know. That is not fair to readers.

Sorry, Mr. S. What I wrote was not directed at you, but to the forum in general.

Al

It seemed pretty clear to me that she was offering two different plans: either behead the plant and let it resprout, or cut off the dead leaves and wait for new growth from the growing tip at the top and the new growing tip at the bottom to produce healthy new growth. Removing the dead foliage wouldn't really fix whatever the problem is, but it also wouldn't hurt anything, and if it happens to make the plant slightly less hideous, there's no reason not to.

In retrospect, I was assuming that the "keeping the photosynthetic machinery intact" part referred to "peel/remove dead foliage," since it followed "peel/remove" immediately, and what you were actually meaning was the beheading plan. Which has caused some confusion. Most of it mine, apparently. Typical.

If it were my personal plant, I would probably go ahead and behead it now, because 1) I'd desperately be wanting to do something about it, and 2) all my previous experience with D. deremensis suggests that the plant probably does have the resources to come back if given a bright, warm spot and dryer soil for a couple months. I have plenty of bright artificial lights I could use for this, instead of relying on winter sun, so that's less of an issue as well. This may not be the ideal approach for nursing the plant back to health, but it would probably work well enough, and I'd rather gamble than endure the shame of having a plant that looks like that in my home for one second longer.* Also, 'Warneckei's are awfully replaceable: if it kicked, I know a half dozen places I could go to get another.

-

*(Not that all of mine are award-winning, show-quality plants, but day-um, that may actually be the fugliest Dracaena I've ever seen. There. I said it.)

I haven't had such a good laugh in months. This post rocks.

lolololol......!