How To Tame a Corn Plant

I enjoy house plants and think they add a ton of character and warmth to a room. They just make any space seem alive. Taking care of them can be a chore, or there are a few that really don’t take a lot of work. I like those. I can kill a plant really easily, so sturdy plants are my style. A tall plant to fill a corner can be just what any room needs. Sometimes they get out of control. This is when I had to learn How To Tame A Corn Plant.

This plant has done really well in this spot the last couple of years. We get amazing light in this house, and the morning light from this window is just what this corn plant loves. (This pic is from my 2022 Summer Home Tour. )

This is how small the plant was when I bought it in 2018. (You can see this post about the final details of putting this room together here. )

Then as it grew it filled out more and more. This is a multi-stalk corn plant, so it got taller and bushier. I soon had to tie some of the stalks together to keep it a tall column. I also repotted it so it had more growing room. You can see how much taller it had gotten from the above picture.

Now it was even taller and bushier and starting to look strained. The top leaves were spotted and looked brown. Time to give this plant some care. The spotting can be caused because I gave it too much or not enough water, or it needs to be replanted. I am going to try pruning first.

My daughter is a great plant person, she can make anything grow. So she came over and gave my plant some pruning. Time to thin out some of the stalks. Some are multi-stalked. A shoot will take off from the main stalk and this makes them really bushy.

She cut this one off at the point where there was a shoot starting to come off the side. This took a lot of the bushy out of the center.

She cut this little stalk off that looked really bad. Time to see if it will grow a new shoot or just get rid of it altogether.

She took several of the tall cuts home to sprout them and see if she can get them to grow. Once all the pruning was done the plant looked so much healthier and happier. Here is how the plant looks after about a month.