House plants detest six things, Let’s see the list of 6 Reasons why your plants are dying prematurely
1. Settled Home
Like people, houseplants enjoy having a comfortable environment.
Our plants grow finicky without a stable environment, and we start to notice things like leaf drop on the plants.
Your plant really doesn’t like it when you move it around your house all the time because this doesn’t give it a stable environment to grow in.
Have you ever brought a plant home from the store just to watch it mysteriously drop its leaves and suffer for a few weeks? I have, and the reason is that we are relocating the plant from a rather stable place in the nursery into a new environment in our home.
Plant nurseries are able to provide ideal circumstances for houseplants because they are continually warm and humid, and when we bring them home, where it is typically less humid, they experience a jolt, which occasionally causes leaves to fall.
House plants need constancy because they typically originate from tropical regions where they are exposed to warm, humid climates year-round. In contrast, our homes
experience warm, humid conditions in the spring and summer and warm,
dry conditions in the winter. This fluctuation in humidity when we turn on the heat
frequently causes crispy leaves on plants or leaf drops.
Our recommendation is to keep your home’s environmental conditions consistent for your plants, which includes not moving them around too frequently. Although it may not be obvious to you, your house’s various environmental conditions will affect each area’s delicate plants differently.
If we frequently move our plants between each places, we are not producing a constant environment and our plants will grow fussy, so pick a spot and try to leave the plant there to become settled. For example, a south-facing living room will be warmer and more humid than a north-facing bedroom.
2. Strong Root System
Without a strong root system, your plant will not grow healthy and strong. If the roots are good your plant is good so it’s really important that we look after the roots of our plants and ensure they do not become rotten. Rotting roots is one of the most common reasons beginner plant owners kill their plants and one of the main causes of this is planting your plant into a pot that is 2 sizes bigger than the existing pot size.
We can all appreciate how time-consuming and messy potting and repotting are. It is one of the least favorite plant care routines and one way you may be shortcutting this is to pot your plant up into a much larger pot than it’s currently in. If you think that by putting your plant up into a much larger pot you won’t have to do it again for a few years but be warned this can be seriously detrimental to the roots of your plant. If you put your plant up into a pot that is far bigger than the root ball of the plant then the ratio of soil to roots will be weighted far too much soil which will lead to excessive moisture problems for the roots of the plant.
Soil retains moisture which means that the root ball of the plant will be sat in a mass of moist soil for too long due to the amount of soil in the pot outweighing the size of the roots and this can eventually lead to rot it’s important therefore to only up pot your plant into a pot that is one or two sizes bigger than its existing pot this won’t shock the roots of the plant it means the roots can slowly stretch out into the new soil.
3. Putting stones or gravel in the pot’s base
It is a typical plant hack used by indoor plant growers, but your house plants detest it because it is bad for the plant’s roots. Experienced indoor plant gardeners frequently stress the necessity of adequate soil drainage, and adding gravel to the bottom of plant pots has long been considered a useful approach to enhance drainage. The nursery pot is filled with potting gravel, or stones, and soil and then the plant is planted. This causes the plant to be sitting in soil with a layer of stones at the bottom of the pot acting as a reservoir for water to be pulled by roots. The idea is to prevent the roots from becoming wet and rotting, but it doesn’t actually work in real life.
The purpose of the hack is defeated since once the plant roots touch the gravel, they won’t stop growing and will instead continue to grow in this gravel’s water reservoir. The plant’s roots will only desire to grow into the gravel in this situation, which will result in unhappy roots that prefer the water reservoir over the soil. All we are really doing is limiting how much dirt the plant can use in the pot, which is bad for the plant. A plant needs soil to draw up the nutrients and moisture it needs for growth, and if it isn’t provided with it, it won’t be as healthy as a plant grown in nutrient-rich soil. It’s as simple as that: place your plant in a plastic nursery pot with enough drainage holes so that extra water may drain out instead of adding gravel to the pots.
4. Plants don’t like being touched too much
Plants don’t like being touched too much, particularly succulents.
Succulents such as Echeverias have something called Farina on their leaves. Farina is the white powdery coating of wax you’ve probably noticed on the leaves of succulents like echeverias and it plays an important role in keeping your succulent healthy. This powdery coating protects the leaves from excessive water absorption because it’s water-repellent. Excessive water for the succulent will lead to mushy leaves and a generally unhappy plant therefore really important we do not touch the leaves of our succulents to avoid this coating from rubbing off.
Keeping this coating completely intact without any marks will be difficult but it is important to try to avoid this as much as possible this is because damage to the Farina is irreversible and cannot grow back so we are left with a mark on the leaf smudging or leaving our fingerprints on the leaves will be permanent so the plant will look unsightly until that leaf falls up.
5. To photosynthesize, plants require clean leaves
Without light, a plant cannot photosynthesize or store energy for growth, which is why it is crucial for plants to have a lot of healthy foliage to catch the sunlight.
Because plants dislike having dirt on their leaves, it’s best to keep your houseplants clean if you want them to grow healthily.
The amount of light your plant can absorb to photosynthesize and store energy will be reduced if the leaves of your plant have a thick layer of dust on them.
We struggle with this because cleaning a lot of plants might take a lot of time, but the old method of one cleaning per day keeps the plants healthy.
Additionally, as part of your weekly routine, every time you water plants, inspect them to see how they’re doing. See if there are any pests or diseases that need to be dealt with and if the leaves are clear of dust and debris.
You can maintain the plants clean by giving them a short wipe if they are beginning to accumulate a layer of dust and then moving on to the next plant.
This method of routine plant maintenance is significantly simpler than thoroughly cleaning every plant.
6. Frequently misting the plant
Misting is a frequent practice that many individuals engage in because they believe it will make their plants healthier, but in reality, it actually harms the plant.
Even though there is no proof that it benefits your plants in any way, this house plant care advice is frequently shared on blogs and youtube.
The practice of misting houseplant leaves is based on the notion that high humidity is necessary for them to flourish in our living spaces. For example, Calathea require high humidity to avoid developing the dreaded crispy brown edges on their leaves, so if we can raise the humidity in our homes, we will have happy Calatheas.
Without a dedicated humidifier, it is very difficult to increase the humidity in our homes, which are typically low in humidity—especially in the winter when we have central heating on. Many people also mistakenly believe that misting plants will increase the humidity around them, but this is not true. Actually, there is no true remedy to this other than spending money on a humidifier that you can customize to your indoor plants’ needs.
It is assumed that the water you sprinkled on your plant’s leaves will gradually evaporate and increase the humidity in the air surrounding it. The issue with this method is that misting your plant only serves to moisten the leaves,
which quickly dry out and do not provide any additional humidity for the plant. The tiny amount of evaporation given off by the wet leaves will be so negligible that no additional
humidity is provided. Doing this will also increase the risk of fungus and rot developing on the leaves because you are leaving water droplets on the leaves to dry.
Other methods, such as setting your plants on top of pebble trays filled with water or the more absurd method of boiling water in your kitchen all day to evaporate water into your home, all claim to enhance humidity. However, none of these methods will improve humidity for your plants. The only solution is a specialized humidifier that you may put close to your more delicate plants.
