I am intrigued by the way some neoregelias handle there variegation! Or is it I that am manipulating (unknowingly!) it? Are there ways to grow variegated plants to enhance the variegation and for the same argument, are there ways to grow plants in a way that they can loose their variegation?

About a year ago, I got a very small pup of De Rolf, nicely variegated:

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I planted the pup and gave it some slow release food. It also got some foliar feeding about once a month. After 8 months, this is what it looked like (all new leaves with almost no variegation at all!):

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I ordered another De Rolf and selected the one with the widest variegation, scared that it would be loosing the variegation again. In the mean time, I planted the first one in a spot where it got full morning sun. From sun up untill about mid day. And after another 6 months, this it what it looks like. No other special treatment and the variegation is coming back in the new leaves!:

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But here is plant nr 2 when I got it:

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And here is the same plant a couple of months later. It was planted with a little bit of slow releae food, got some morning sun but not much but bright light for the rest of the day. And the variegation is dissappearing!!!

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And De Rolf is not the only plant that does that to me! Can variegation in plant be influenced by growing conditions? Like the local climate, too little or too much water, too little or too much food, too little or too much light?

Please tell my any thing that you might have experienced or heard or read about this!

Thanks,

Japie