How Not to Kill Your Houseplant: Survival Tips for the Horticulturally Challenged

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Set an alarm on your phone or mark your calendar with the days your plants need to be watered. If keeping tabs on plant thirst isn’t your cup of tea, opt for houseplants that don’t mind a dry spell.

Pilea are good plants to use in a terrarium or to place on a high shelf, where you can enjoy their cascading nature. Leaves are the biggest telltale sign of how healthy your houseplant is, and there are several things you should be doing regularly to keep them in top condition.Overwatering succulents will make the leaves swell, causing oedema and leaf-drop. Because a closed terrarium can get very moist, succulents are not suited to being grown in these. Conversely, if you under-water the plants, they will become misshapen and scarred. If you're cold then so is your houseplant. Always keep them in places that are at least the minimum temperature that they'll accept. Further Reading Pilea depressa, also known as baby tears, resembles a leafy moss with cascading small, round leaves and is a popular trailing houseplant, as it’s easy to look after. Do you think the pandemic has made us more attached to our plants and gardens? Is the 'plantdemic' real, in other words, and if so, what could be some of the reasons? Like the very best kinds of houseplants, all three have thrived on a regime of benign neglect, a minimal intervention approach that asks only that they be watered occasionally (less in winter, more in summer) and be given an occasional nourishing liquid feed during the growing season. In return for so little, they give me a sharp jolt of joy and pleasure each and every time I look at them, transforming my living space in a way that’s quite impossible to quantify.

This is a broad topic, with lots to cover, so if you're struggling to find the balance here as a proud plant parent, have a read of our watering guide linked just below. The bad news is they have a variety of different needs and we all have different growing environments. This means you can do any number of the "mistakes" listed in our article which can all end in disaster.Plants have a direct connection to mental wellbeing. At the very basic level, plants offer us instant visual relief. Think of how you feel when you enter an apartment that has a few plants versus a stark office setting. The fluid, natural forms of plants break the hard, inanimate settings we inhabit. It’s like watching fish, an activity prescribed those who are stressed, anxious, and even heart patients.