Turmeric is notoriously late to sprout here in Iowa, but once again I have managed to coax my favorite turmerics out of dormancy here.
These are green and black varieties.
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How beautiful that they come up red!
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Iāve always read that turmeric rhizomes are destroyed by freezing temperatures. However, while clearing out some weeds to dig a trench for electric lines (for my greenhouse), I found this sprout outside in a pot, where it has been for at least a year (possibly longer, as I donāt recall placing anything there last year). Last yearās coldest temp in my part of northwest Iowa was -15 degrees, which certainly would have caused freezing temps inside that pot.
To add to my surprise, this turmeric appears to be a curcuma caesia (blue or black), which, in my past experience, have been less hardy than curcuma longas (red and orange). Iāll be monitoring this plant closely from now on. 
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whispers- it likes the neglect!
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Haha maybe. I did give it a bit of water today, and plan to at least look at it more than once this year. 
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To be fair if I found it like that I would give some extra love. Hehe
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Meanwhile, in my indoor grow tent, I have the tallest turmeric plant Iāve ever seenā¦ itās slightly over 5 feet tall!
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Wow! Do you keep these indoors year round?
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In previous years I had them outside in the summer, but with greenhouse construction this year, my plants have been a bit neglected.
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Some interesting observationsā¦ at this point in the summer, most of my turmerics have put out 3 leaves. However, the one outside (that survived in a pot for at least one north Iowa winter), is much shorter and has smaller leaves compared to my turmerics inside. There are many potential factors here (amount of water given, summer temps inside vs out), but Iām curious if thereās anything about this specific rhizome that allowed it to survive what it wasnāt supposed to. I may see try to start a controlled trial with these rhizomes next year!
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Your inside ones look like they are stretching for the light some. Since Iowa has longer days than a turmericās normal habitat (in the summer), it probably is getting excess sun outside, so it doesnāt need to grow as tall or have large leaves. For turmeric or ginger (etc) this isnāt an issue, just different growth habits in different enviroments.
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My grocery store turmeric. Itās doing well being neglected, I thinkā¦this is the first year Iāve managed to get one to sprout. I water it most days if it didnāt rain. Should the leaves be darker? Does it need to be fertilized?
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Your leaves look healthy from what I can tell. I usually give mine compost at the beginning of the season and mid season to eventually help with rhizome development.
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