Plant of the day is: Dracaena draco or dragon blood tree
IUCN: Vulnerable
As you can see, much like Dumbledore, this plants got style. Hopefully I can keep an interested coworker from stabbing into it and investigating its common namesake. I've been meaning to write about this one for some time and it might as well be today. Probably one of my most closely watched seedlings at the moment, very excited to see my two inch start grow into one of these majestic "trees".
Taxonomy, etc.: As good of a point as any to explain why tree is in quotation marks above. While the dragon blood tree does eventually grow into something resembling a tree, it is not really a tree in the traditional sense. Much like other palms, it is a monocot and does not form wood in the usual way with secondary growth from the cork cambium and vascular cambium (lateral meristems). See a quick video on secondary growth here! Instead of forming bark from a cork cambium, these clever plants essentially harden their outer layers with various sclerified or hardened cells left over from the bases of previously shed fronds. The drawback to this is that treelike monocots cannot make use of compartmentalization to protect wounds against pests like a real tree can.
You wouldn't think of this as an asparagus but it is in the Asparagaceae family, definitely an odd cousin. Dracaena is derived from ancient Greek drakaina or female dragon. There are about 120 species, the majority of which are native to Africa. Sansevieria is actually a very closely related genus. I did not know that. If you've ever seen "lucky bamboo" you'll notice a close relative of D. draco here. D. braunii is frequently sold as "lucky bamboo" despite uhhh, not being bamboo. In a different life I had some for awhile until I killed it. If you like the genus Dracaena you can thank Linnaeus for making this specific epithet cooler. D. draco used to be Asparagus draco. Lame.
El Drago Milenario (the thousand-year-old dragon) growing at Icod de los Vinos in Northwest Tenerife. It is estimated to be about 250 to 365 years old and the largest specimen alive.
Description: One of the tree Dracaena, grows to a width of up to 10m with a similar height in culture. It can get quite a bit taller in its native environment over a great deal of time. Typically a little taller than wide at maturity but has a bit of a varied growth habit throughout its life. It grows as a single stem for the first 10-15 years of its life and then begins to flower and form more lateral stems. The base is supported by aerial roots that emerge from the base of the lower stems and closely hug the central stem, forming a mass of wood-like roots. Leaves are about .7m long and 3.8 cm in width and blue-green in color. The bark, when cut or bruised releases a red resin that looks similar to blood and has been used for a variety of purposes including wood staining, medicine, and embalming the dead.
by Wellcome Images (CC BY 4.0)
Looks crazy right? It was actually a thing. The Guanches hollowed out the trunk into a little hobbit-like sanctuary which Humboldt saw when he visited. Sadly destroyed by a storm in 1868 :(.
Habitat/culture: Native to the Canary Islands, Cape Verde, Madeira, and western Morocco. Near extirpated in Madeira and Porto Santo. Only a few hundred left in the Canaries. There is a nice remote pocket of them in North Africa that has several thousand, so ...that is nice, though they are likely a variant. Would be sad to lose the genetics of the rest forever. It is tolerant of temperatures around 20-25 F and is very heat and drought tolerant. I'll be transferring my seedling to a very well drained media and root promoting pot very soon. Dracaena, in general, tend to be pretty forgiving in terms of nutrition as well, basically, be a little mean to them and withhold. Slow release fertilizers like Osmocote are nice.
Propagation: Keep in mind that the seeds are recalcitrant (die if they dry out). Can be stored for a few months if kept moist. I like to soak my seeds before sowing, typically overnight, to jump start imbibition. For these, I put them in a 50/50 potting soil/perlite mix in a 4" tall pot and covered with humidity dome with bottom heat 80F+ (lot of the palms like it toasty to germ) just make sure you watch your water, they can never dry out.
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