#inside plants

So, firstly, if you're new to plants, you might be wondering, well what is so bad about over watering? After all, they're plants aren't they? Don't they need water to survive? The more the merrier? And to you I say, good point, here's why it can work with plants outside, but not plants in little pots inside.

Have you ever left a piece of organic matter in the water? Like, a leaf, or even a flower in a flower vase. If you left it in for a week, it develops a bad smell, and the leaves, stems and roots will start to degrade, ferment, and rot in the water. That's exactly what's happening to the roots of your houseplants if they're left in an overly-wet soil; they don't have any access to oxygen, and they rot. Outside, the soil is constantly draining the water further down, the earth is capable of absorbing a lot of water while leaving the topsoil pleasantly damp, but not liquid with water. So you need to make sure your soil is never so wet that it rots your plants roots; if it comes to that, your plant will start turning brown or black, become squishy and spongy, and eventually rot completely.

So how do you avoid it? You'll often hear advice about 'having good drainage', which means your pot needs to have little holes for the water to come out, and the soil shouldn't be so dense and clayish that it would stop water from draining through. However, even if you have perfect drainage, you can still pour in so much water that the little tray under the pot is filled with water – thus the plants sit in water again, rotting. It's difficult to see whether the soil is saturated with water too, sometimes the top of the soil can seem completely dry and you don't see if it's all the way dry or not, it can be misleading. You also can't just stick to a watering schedule because the soil dries out at different speed, based on humidity, heating, temperature, season, exposure to sunlight, it will be different every time. So how can you get around this problem?

The solution I found works perfectly is: lift the pot. As soon as you feel the weight of the pot in your hands, you'll be able to tell whether that thing is heavy as if it's filled with water, or if it's so light that there's barely any water in it. If your pot is super heavy and feels like you just lifted a bucket of water, leave it be, do not water it for a week, until it becomes a normal weight (it should feel like one third of it is water). If your pot is so light, that it feels like nothing is in it at all, then you need to water enough to fill that entire tray underneath, and then let the soil absorb the water for a while. If the soil is super dry, it becomes hydrophobic, and it will take time for it to start absorbing water again; but don't worry, if you leave it sitting in water overnight, it should be fine again, and the plants won't start to rot after just one day of sitting water. A normal watering should be just one third of the container of the plant, that should saturate the soil so it's damp, but not dripping with water.

A further step you can take to make sure your plants are happy with the amount of water, is to research the plants themselves, and how they like to be watered. Most plants will do well on having their soil pleasantly damp, but some houseplants like to have their soil dry out completely before they get a good amount of water again; for instance, lemon trees like that feeling of being dried completely, and then being watered generously, because they're used to growing in tropical areas, and going through droughts and rainfall. Some plants are capable of taking moisture from the air, but they still love having a good amount of water in the pot. Nothing will give you better insight than researching every plant separately.

So what about succulents? You may have been told that you can ignore succulents and they'll be fine, however I found this not to be true, after my poor neglected succulent died due to non watering. You can't even use the trick of lifting the pot, if you're having succulents and aloe vera, because those plants keep water inside of their bodies, so if you lift the pot, it might be heavy, not because it's filled with water, but because the plants themselves are heavier, keeping water inside of themselves. They absolutely need water too, there's just a difference in how long they can do without it. But we're not trying to give those plants endurance tests, we're trying to make sure they're happy and thriving. So how to know when to water your succulents or aloe vera?

The solution is: you try to see if they're squishy. A succulent happily filled with water, will be firm and sturdy to touch. If your succulent is starting to dry, and is now spending the water they have in their inside store, they'll become squishy! If you lightly press with your fingers on the leaf, or the stem of a succulent, and it gives way and squishes, that means the plant needs more water in order to be happy. The squishiness starts closer to the base and the stem of the plant, so if you can check the widest, most base leafs, you'll get the best idea of whether they need water or not. Also, if you see any leaves on them that are dried, brown, dying away, you can pull these off! Your plants are only burdened by keeping dead plant matter on, if you pull those off the plant will immediately look healthier, have less to worry about, and be ready to grow new healthy leaves.

Any big plant can generally survive longer without water than a smaller plant, simply because they are able to store water inside of themselves, so they have some reserve. You always have to keep a closer eye on your tiniest little plants, and your giant plants will need your attention less frequently. Another tip is to have your plants somewhere you see them every day, because if your plant is somewhere you have to specifically go to see it and water it, it is likely you'll forget about its existence until it's too late. Even writing this I remembered I had some plants on a window that I don't usually use, and I've forgot to water them for two weeks. Oops. (they're fine I watered them now).

A few weeks ago, I was checking on my plants and saw a brown leaf in my pothos pot. I was about to simply pluck it out and toss it when I noticed a tiny bit of green on it towards the end of the stem. I thought, “Huh. Why not? I got nothing but time” so I place it in some water to see what it would do.

It did nothing for quite a while. I figured I’d try one more method and dug a little hole in this planter of dirt. The leaf had finally let go of its grasp on this small slice of green so I really only had a sliver of a green stem I could stick in the dirt.

Now she’s showing life! I realize it’s not much but thinking about where it came from and how I almost tossed it in the trash, and now I’m going to have another plant I can spoil!