Re: Elephant ears
Oh, no...there are quite a few EE's that are very cold hardy. First off, 'Ruffles' may be just as cold hardy as 'Pink China'. Burgundy Stem is very cold hardy as runners and surely if you re-bury the bulb on big ones they will return (in zone 7, anyway). After that a very cold winter (like last winter) might cause some to die off, but Illustrus is a very good one. Brian Williams (the guy who came out with Pink China) has a bunch of new mutations coming out that are based on Pink China. He claims that they are all zone 6! The types that are coming out are very cool, but he claims that there are some "in the works" that are even cooler. You can see some of them on the agristarts website and more photos on Brian Williams' website. Randy4UT has overwintered tons of very cool, exotic types with some protections (and he lives very near me...I just don't have as much luck with them). In zone 7 you should be able to grow a ton of types and get them to return with minimal effort in all but the worst winters...and again, new cool stuff in the pipeline.
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