Victory being a patented plant that you can't propagate by division should be being offered by a number of suppliers as larger plants. I believe Q and Z is the producer. I saw some larger plants being sold on the Hosta Library Auction last summer.I am sure that LOG will tell you what you are paying for. Rob

Here's the Krossa Regal that I received from LOTG last year.
{{gwi:951396}}

Big plant isn't it? However, note that there are basically two eyes here. There are lots of leaves, but the root system was small. Here's what it looked like in August.
{{gwi:951397}}
I taped it up and I staked it. I watered it every other day all summer. Basically, I think the small root system couldn't support that much foliage. It survived, but it did not, by any means, thrive or grow. You have to remember that last year LOTG had difficulty with weather and with illness and thus they didn't ship until later in the summer. That won't work for you in Tejas.

I would email Chris at Hallson and tell him what you want. See if he can accommodate you. If he can't then try Rob Mortko at Made in the Shade. I know he carries Victory. You probably need to be ready to pay for a double division.

Steve

If you want a mature division give Jim at Jim's hostas a call. He generally sells one or two eyed mature divisions and maybe able to work a deal for you if you want an even larger size.

Scott

I'm going to put my Victory on here, to show what it looks like today. I got it late last summer from Hostahosta.com and I did not see it until it was dormant around Thanksgiving. So this is my first real look at the plant.

Can you tell me why it looks like it has everything pulled up tight into a ponytail on top? I'd say it was two eyes about to come out, but don't know if that is right or not.

Just for comparison, I'm putting it into this thread and not in the new one I'm starting about plants showing eyes.

Yes, those are two eyes sticking up. Unfortunately, the soilless mix has receded showing the roots. You should add more mix to that pot to cover those roots.

Steve

buy it big .. IN PERSON .. and you will get what you want ... of course.. i do understand you dont have many hosta sellers your way ....

basically .. if i understand your request ... you want a plant that will take 5 to 10 years to mature.. and you want a 5 to 10 year old plant ... and dont we all ...

but you are buying potential ... because you are simply not going to get a 5 year old plants sent thru the mail ...

pix below.. and i am sorry .. i have no clue when it was planted.. but would guess .. 5 to 7 years ago .... even if i were to agree to send it to you.. i would have to cut off so many roots trying to dig it up.. i wouldnt be surprised it was half size next year ...

i know we are walking a tightrope here with prior conversations .. but i could not ignore the post ... i hope i succeeded without bringing up old arguments ... you are simply not going to get a big plant in the mail .. unless you hook up a uhaul .. and head to iowa .... which is the closest hosta mecca i can think of for you ...

ken
no scale.. but i will guess between 3 and 4 feet tall ... and the same wide ....
{{gwi:951399}}

{{gwi:951400}}

Here is what I got in 2010 from Land of the Giants Hosta Farm. It seems you will not get multi-eye, but divisions from mature plants :

Hornbaker Gardens do sell hosta by the clump through the mail from $25.00-$60.00 with $12.00 shipping for instant gratification from 3 to 5 year old clumps but they didn't have Victory by the clump. The biggest they list are Sagae and S&S for $50.00.

They have their regular potted Victory for $18.00.

Their clump price list:
http://www.hornbakergardens.com/pdf/38_hostas-price-list.pdf

My $4.75 Victory will be a 3 year old TC this year. It's still a baby and looks silly planted with nothing even close to it. I left a 3' radius around it so it has room to grow.

Mine hasn't broken ground yet, so I'm going to assume it will be single eyed again. It didn't have time to grow any last fall. Maybe I should get two more and add to the pot I already have. I've done the three to a pot several times, and it makes a nice pot a lot sooner. (The photo probably is of three Victory, as they plant three of everything.)

Moccasin, Victory was beautiful in August last year at the Dallas Arboretum. I don't know how old it is, but after a blazing hot summer, it didn't have a single burned leaf. I'm hoping it will do as well for me in a pot. (The leaf damange is from 2 hailstorms. Since we had no rain either, the crape myrtle blossoms just sat there on the leaves.)

bkay

what you are hoping to get with a large plant.. is a pre-grown large root system ...

with the giants ... its all about growing the roots to support the giant ...

the first pic of a LOTG plant way above.. is going to shrink ...

but the second set of pic from LOTG .... shows a monster root mass.. compared to what we think of TC ... the money you pay is for that root mass ...

there is still a great potential for them to shrink for a year .. but you know there is a big root mass that will explode the second year ...

any crown division.. will set the plant back.. take that as etched in granite ...

the best example i can come up with is Gisela ... who appears to have a local source of giant potted material.. that goes in the ground.. and never looks back.. instant gratification.. and worth the higher cost.. but there arent many of us who have that kind of source ....

but i just dont see how there can be a mail order equivalent... and i have no experience with hornbakers as noted above.. that might be your best shot..

and call them..

a seller needs to have a certain inventory to list in a catalog ... say 10 or 20 ....

but that does NOT mean they may not have 2 or 3 laying around.. that they would be able to sell.. so when searching for something.. ONLY a call will help ... [i still think email is too impersonal ... ]

ken

Sorry, the Elvis Lives plant I got from LOTG actually had several eyes, as also shown in above picture.
The other plant is not Victory, but Olive Baily Langdon. I bought two OBL and planted them together. This is how two divisions of a mature plant look after one year :

It is very common for a retailer to offer larger divisions of plants that have been on the market for years. Ken is right that most mail order companies do not like to ship ( and most customers are not willing to pay for) extra large divisions of giant plants. I bought a couple of H. Victory about 4 years ago. It may be the location or just the natural growing rate for my conditions but they are slow growing for me. They are getting big but not putting on many new eyes. I am hoping for the leap and maybe have one the looks like Kens.

So, the three smaller ones will work just fine. Made in the Shade has it as does White Oak. I'm waiting for Chris to return my email, in case he has some.

I think Victory likes the heat. I keep saying how good it looked last year at the Arboretum, but I'm not overstating it. It may have been the best looking hosta there in August. The Sun hosta wasn't burned either. All others were burned to some extent and some were totally melted, even plantaginea offspring.

By August of last year, I was melted, too, come to think of it. It's the worst summer we've had since 1980. Yet Victory was unfazed by the heat. Now, we'll see how it does in a pot.

bkay

I had to go back and reconstruct my invoices to see exactly where my plants came from, and why I got two of some. Those plants which came in multiples were from Hostahosta, Solbergs place. They were offering some at end of season as "twofers." And that is how I ended up with

TWO 'Beet Salads'
TWO 'Curly Fries'
TWO 'Victory'
And each of the two Victory plants turned out to have two complete sets of eyes or two separate root systems which were pretty massive. Compared to the other plants I've purchased, I thought I'd paid for one eye per Victory. Not so. Nice healthy roots, but so far only the dormant eyes and I'm still waiting for that blush of green to pip out with a full blown EYE.

It is good to know that Victory can take the heat such as you had in the Texas drought last year. We had a sort of drought, but not as deep and enduring as Texas had, or even other parts of the southeast. It is a good thing we installed a municipal irrigation meter last year, because sewer fees are twice the cost of water here. We have good drinking water, but it sure smells like chlorine bleach. I am also setting up two 60 gallon cisterns to collect rain water for watering container plants.

Speaking of large hosta, I am holding my breath to see what S&S does. It has one eye up, now about 4 inches tall, to go with that MASSIVE root system which held onto the soil when I dug it out of the Massachusetts garden last October. It filled up a 5 gallon bucket after being in the ground one year. I turned the bucket on its side to keep rain from getting into it, so it did not rot any that I can tell.

I suppose ignorance is bliss, because I did not know that having them rained on during the winter could cause crown rot. But now that I DO KNOW, I am no longer immune due to ignorance. Since I repotted S&S this last week, I've sunk an umbrella in the pot with it to keep the rain out as much as possible. We'll see what happens next.

Only people like us will have umbrellas, sheets, boxes, and shade clothes in their yards to protect their hosta!

An UMBRELLA????? LMAO Hey, I'm a believer, do whatever it takes.

-Babka

I don't cover mine in the winter. The only time I've lost any is when I bought that Miracle Grow Moisture Control potting soil. Of course, I have more winter than Babka, which may be a factor, too.

bkay

Frank, it is always good to have several shade cloths (burlap, spun row cover, landscape fabric) on two sticks each in the garage. I use it to shade new dwarf conifers individually, helps a lot!
Bernd