{"product_id":"cordyline-fruticosa-john-klass","title":"Cordyline fruticosa John Klass","description":"\u003cp\u003eFew plants with this much colour sit as comfortably around a pool or an outdoor living area as John Klass, a ti plant whose leaves are streaked cream and green with hot pink edges, the amount of cream varying from plant to plant. It is soft leafed with no spines, upright enough to keep its foliage off paths and coping, and its compact roots do not chase pipes or lift paving. Seen from a sun lounge or a deck chair, the colour sits close to eye level, and where winters are warm it keeps that colour all year rather than arriving with a flowering season.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBecause no two plants are marked quite alike, a group reads as a lively, mixed mass of colour, and one plant in a big glazed pot does the work of a flowering shrub without the dropped petals.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003ePool, paving and reflected heat\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eCordylines are one of the tidier choices beside water. They drop few leaves, and the ones they shed are large and easy to pick up rather than a steady fall of small leaves into the skimmer. Our guide to \u003ca href=\"\/blogs\/news\/poolside-planting-australia\"\u003epoolside planting\u003c\/a\u003e explains why that matters and what else works there. The things to manage are heat and splash. Pale paving and glass fencing throw light and heat back into the plant, and on a west facing pool deck that can scorch leaf edges right through summer. Morning sun with some afternoon shade, or bright light through palms, keeps the colour strong without burning it. Beside a salt water pool, splash left to dry on the leaves can mark them, so plant back from the edge where the splashing is heaviest.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBright filtered light strengthens the pink, but the cream sections are the first to scorch, and in heavy shade the plant greens and stretches. Cold is its limit. It lives outdoors all year only where winters stay frost free and mild, which in practice means the Queensland coast, northern New South Wales and warm, sheltered gardens around Sydney and Perth; anywhere colder, it belongs in a big tub on castors, rolled under a roof when the evenings turn cold. Think twice about it on a pool deck where a young dog spends its days, since all of it, leaf to root, is toxic to dogs and cats.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eAgainst the solid red and the cabbage trees\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eIf you prefer a single colour to a blend, \u003ca href=\"\/products\/cordyline-fruticosa-rubra\"\u003eCordyline fruticosa Rubra\u003c\/a\u003e is solid burgundy red, wants the same warmth but takes more sun, and reads more formally around a pool. John Klass is lighter and busier, the cream and pink breaking up each leaf. For a frosty garden, hardy cabbage trees such as \u003ca href=\"\/products\/red-sensation-cordyline-cordyline-australis-red-sensation\"\u003eRed Sensation Cordyline\u003c\/a\u003e survive winters outdoors that John Klass will not, but they make a poor pool plant, because their long, fibrous dead leaves end up in skimmers and filters. Around water in a warm garden, John Klass is the more practical of the two; for the rest of a poolside bed that should look after itself, start with \u003ca href=\"\/collections\/low-maintenance\"\u003eLow Maintenance Plants\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eKeeping it furnished at seating height\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eLeft alone, the cane lengthens and the colour drifts above eye level, leaving bare stem where you want leaves. Shorten it once the weather is warm, to about the eye line of someone seated, and two or three shoots usually follow from the stump; staggering cuts across a group keeps colour at several heights. Give it controlled release granules as spring starts and a second dose around Christmas, and water deeply through hot weather, especially in pots standing on paving, which dry out much faster than garden beds. Pull yellowing lower leaves before they fall. Mealybug likes the sheltered leaf bases, and a firm jet from the hose shifts it before it builds up.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3 class=\"pd-size-guidance\"\u003eChoosing a size\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis plant is supplied in one size, 300mm, at $78.95 per plant. The size shown is the pot it arrives in, which is the rootball, not the height of the plant. Not sure which to choose? Read our guide to \u003ca href=\"\/blogs\/news\/low-water-gardens-australia\"\u003elow water gardens\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Plant Drop","offers":[{"title":"300mm","offer_id":67670721298801,"sku":null,"price":78.95,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1017\/1049\/6113\/files\/cordyline-fruticosa-john-klass.jpg?v=1791514783","url":"https:\/\/plantdrop.com.au\/products\/cordyline-fruticosa-john-klass","provider":"Plant Drop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}