Zabrina

5 |6 Reviews

Elephant Ear plant

Alocasia zebrina

• 
  Bright light
• 
  Easy care

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• Zabrina likes...

  • 

    Regular watering

    She likes her soil to stay lightly moist. Water her when her top two inches of soil are dry.

  • 

    Medium light

    Her big leaves like a lot of light, but not direct sun. Away from a window in a bright room is ideal.

  • 

    Humidity

    Moisture in the air helps keep her leaves healthy. The best way to provide that is with regular misting.

• Quick facts

  Botanical name

  Alocasia zebrina

  Nickname

  Elephant Ear plant 

  Plant type

  Perennial, indoor

  Air purifying

  Yes

  Plant height (including pot)

  55-65cm; 90-100cm

  Pet/baby safe

  Toxic if ingested

  Nursery pot size

  19cm; 21cm

• About Elephant Ear plant

  A tropical plant that brings big jungle vibes, Alocasia zebrina not only has leaves the shape of elephants ears - hence it's common name - but stems with striking zebra stripes. The combination makes for an eye-catching, sculptural houseplant. 

  Zabrina is a native to Brazil, which as you can imagine, is hot, sunny and humid. Here she grows in filtered light at the base of taller trees, which is why her leaves have evolved to grow large and flat, like solar panels that can absorb as much sunlight as possible. To keep your plant happy indoors, your aim is to try and echo her native growing conditions as closely as possible. This means you want to position your Alocasia in a spot that is consistently warm, that gets lots of bright indirect light and that has sufficient humidity.

  To be honest the humidity in most UK homes will be absolutely fine for Zabrina, but if you're in a really well insulated new build in which the air feels dry, then consider grouping your plants together, investing in a humidifier, or popping a bowl of water near your radiator so it can slowly evaporate into the air.

  To give your Elephant Ear plant the best chance at growing into the tropical beauty that it is, give it a feed with liquid fertiliser once a month throughout spring and summer, regularly wipe it's leaves down with a damp cloth to remove any dusty build up, and give it a spritz with bug control spray to keep any critters at bay.

  Oh, and don't forget to repot Zabrina every couple of years. Repotting not only tops up the essential soil nutrients your plant need to grow but gives it's roots room to spread out so that it can put on lots of new shoots.

  Did you know?

  In some parts of the world, the stems, which are poisonous raw, are boiled for a long time to make them edible. We don’t recommend this.

• Reviews

  5 |6 Reviews

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  Most recent reviews

  

  Ellie

  Reasonable value for money and the care instructions/support provided has been a great help. The plant itself has withstood varying conditions so far and was as described.

  Showing most recent 1 reviews