The Pineapple Lives!

I had always been under the impression that the pineapple plant itself dies after it bears fruit so after my pineapple bore fruit this summer, I pretty much ignored it — rarely watering it at all.  I’ve even left it out at night in sub-60F evening weather thinking that I was going to dump it anyways.

Lo and behold, as I was walking past it yesterday, I noticed something…interesting:

Pineapple with two (three??) plants

I’m not quite sure what happened here as it appears as if there are now three plants in my pot with two of them growing out of the original (click the picture to see a larger one).  I also peeled back the dead leaves at the base.  Check out the root system:

Check out that root system.

For reference, here is a wider shot that shows the two new (?) plants, the original plant, and the root system:

Wide shot

The pineapple is indeed a fascinating plant!