Welcome to growing your own food in your own backyard. If you are new to my channel, please consider subscribing and don't forget to hit the like button. My pineapple plants are now 2 years old and they continue to grow successfully. I started my pineapple plants from the tops of organic fresh pineapples. Check the card above for my playlist on how to start and grow pineapple plants in zone 5B in the Northern climates. My pineapple plants are growing in containers and believe it or not, pineapple plants is one of the few tropical fruits that are well adapted to planting in containers with drainage holes. I have repotted all three of these pineapple plants at least three times since the beginning of starting my pineapple plants. Now I am growing them outdoors during the summer months and I have been doing this for the past 2 years but I do bring them indoors during the cold or winter months. I bring them in when the temperatures are predicted to go below the 40s. Now I did make one mistake and I put them out this year and you can kind of see where the leaves right here are kind of dark. I got a little anxious and I didn't make sure that the nighttime temperatures was staying above 50 degrees and the pineapple did suffer a little bit but that was an error on my part. I need to be a little more patient when I put these pineapple plants out. You want to make sure that when you do put them out you are putting them out when there are at least the nighttime temperatures at least 50 degrees or above. The optimum temperature for pineapple growth range between 68 degrees and 86 degrees. When growing indoors give them plenty of natural light or grow light. I am growing my pineapple plant and moderately fertile sandy lonely soil as this is the soil they grow best in. You want to keep the soil moist but not soggy. Pineapple plants can take up to 2 to 3 years before flowering. Therefore I am considering inducing flower on this large pineapple plant. This pineapple plant is my largest pineapple plant and it is now 2 years old as of September. So as a result of it I am going to go ahead and try to induce fruit on this particular pineapple plant. You want to remove the developing slips and suckers which will enhance the rate of growth. See if you can see on this particular plant I had little pups over here and I did not remove those pups. So as a result the rate of growth is really slow. If you notice that this plant is bigger this plant has 2 plants in it and it is the second biggest and then this one is growing a lot slower and they all started at the same time. So my tip is remove the developing slips and suckers so you can enhance the rate of growth on your pineapple plant and reduce the time it takes to become a large enough to induce flowering and produce large fruits like this one. Now research has shown that the larger the pineapple plant is when it flowers the larger the potential fruit produce since small plants will produce smaller pineapple plants. So I am not going to induce flowering on this plant or this plant but I am going to induce flowering on this plant because it is mature 2 years old and it is large. Ethylene gas is known to induce flowering. Apples give off ethylene as they decay. So I am going to be putting placing a decaying apple right in the center of this plant and I will cover it with the plastic bag around the plant where it is completely airtight. That way the ethylene gas will be trapped and I will leave the apple in the bag for approximately 40 days to allow it to release gas. I am going to do a video update on whether I am going to be able to get a fruit on this plant that I am going to induce. So I just wanted to give you an update on how successfully my plant has been growing for the past 2 years. Some tips on making sure you are removing the pups off your plants when they first start growing so you don't run into a situation like this where it is growing slow but it is healthy. This is just one plant and you can see how much bigger it is. This one has 2 plants in it and then the rate of growth is slow. So when I bring the plant in during the winter months which I am thinking boy, next week they are talking about the low temperatures being in the 30s. So more than likely I am going to have to bring it in. However if the temperatures continue to be below 50 degrees moving into the end of September I will have to bring it in. Now these plants are gotten so much bigger and I will no longer be able to put them in front of the windows anymore. So this plant here is going to have to go under my grow light and this plant will have to also grow under my grow light. I will put this plant back in the window that has been used to over the past 2 years and then I will start trying to induce flowering on this plant. So if you don't think you can grow pineapple plants in zone 5b in the northern climates think again I have successfully done it and they have been repotted 3 times they grow very well in containers. So it can be done. It would be very exciting to see if I can produce pineapples but I would definitely be bringing you along and letting you know what my results are. So thank you for watching and don't forget to hit the like button.