Asparagaceae

Dracaena

A genus that got much larger in 2017, when molecular work showed Dracaena was paraphyletic with Sansevieria embedded inside it and the whole of Sansevieria was folded in. That means the genus now spans two quite different kinds of plant: the soft-leaved cane dracaenas, and the succulent, CAM, dry-country sansevierias. There is no longer one set of numbers that fits both, so the profile below is written for the snake plant grown here and every figure in it comes from a Sansevieria source.

Native to Southern Nigeria to west-central tropical Africa and Tanzania (the snake plant)

How Dracaena generally wants to be treated

Species pages start from this and record only where they differ.

Light: Very tolerant. Commercial production runs at 1,000-6,000 foot-candles (roughly 10,800-64,600 lux), and it survives a great deal less indoors — but survives is the word. Variegation holds better in brighter light.
Water: Let it dry thoroughly, then water. This is the plant people kill by kindness: it is built for a dry season and its failure mode is rot from below, which is invisible until the leaves go soft at the base.
Humidity: No requirement, and no source publishes a figure for it. NC State says only that it tolerates low humidity.
Temperature: 70-90 °F (21-32 °C) is the published optimum for growth. Keep it above about 55 °F (13 °C); it is a tropical African plant and cold wet roots are the worst combination for it.
Substrate: Free-draining, and pH somewhere in the 6.0-7.5 range where the two published recommendations overlap. Grit or perlite matters more than the base.
Fertilizer: Sparingly, and only in growth. Watch the water supply: this genus is on the published list of fluoride-sensitive plants, where superphosphate and perlite are named as sources — though the entry was written for the old narrower Dracaena, which is worth saying rather than glossing.
Propagation: Division of the rhizome. Leaf cuttings root easily but come up plain green — see the species page; for a variegated plant this is the difference between keeping it and losing it.
Dormancy: None documented. Growth slows in winter; the watering slows with it.
Common problems: Soft, foul-smelling rot at the leaf base is Erwinia soft rot, and it follows overwatering
Southern blight (Sclerotium rolfsii) and Fusarium red leaf spot are the other two named organisms in the production literature
Root-knot nematodes in reused mix
A leaf cutting of a variegated plant reverts to plain green. This is not bad luck — it is what the tissue is
Mushy crown after a cold spell; it does not tolerate cold and wet together
Every part is toxic to cats and dogs — saponins — and unlike most of this list, that is well established

Sources ¹²³⁴⁵⁶⁷⁸⁹

In the collection

Snake plant Dracaena trifasciata (Prain) Mabb. 'Laurentii'