11 Tips to Keep Your Houseplants Alive
Many experienced and new gardeners struggle with keeping houseplants alive. Houseplants are more difficult than other plants to keep alive and often bought on a whim come home to die when forgotten or not cared for properly.
Keeping your house plants alive can be incredibly difficult but well worth the effort as plants in your home can help with stress and depression, particularly over the winter when seasonal depression becomes an issue for many.
These tips will help you keep your indoor plants alive so you can enjoy them as much as possible.
Why is it so hard to keep houseplants alive?
Plants are designed to be grown outside where nature takes care of the needs of native plants. When you grow non-native plants outdoors you need to supplement with water and nutrition.
When growing indoors you are fully replacing the natural environment of your plants. Not knowing your plant’s individual needs or forgetting to care for them.
Tips for keeping your house plants alive
1. Avoid placing house plants near heater or air conditioner vents
Your heating and cooling systems work hard to keep you and your family comfortable. But the temperatures that come out of your vents can be too extreme for your houseplants. Keep your plants away from these to prevent shocking your plants.
2. Avoid placing your plants near a draft
Like with your heating and cooling vents, drafts in the winter can be harmful to your houseplants. Over the winter move your houseplants away from drafty windows that have not been sealed and exterior doors.
3. Use self-watering pots or water globes to help keep plants from drying out
Over the winter your home heating system can leave the air dry. Dry air sucks the moisture out of your plants and soil. Just like it does with our skin in the winter the dry air can leave your plants parched and withered.
4. Consider using a humidifier
While watering your plants and setting up a system to keep them watered is vital there are other moves you can make like installing a humidifier to help keep your air from getting too dry.
This can benefit not only your house plans but also your entire family. In a pinch, if you find the air in your home becoming too dry you can boil a pot of water to naturally add more moisture to the air.
5. Use a quality fertilizer as needed to help your plants thrive
While we often add fresh compost to our outdoor gardens along with a host of fertilizers we often forget to do the same for our houseplants. Using fertilizers in your house plants can help speed their growth and keep them healthy in the long term.
6. Mulch your house plants
You know that mulch helps to keep your plants healthy in the summer by trapping in the soil during the summer heat. This trick works well on house plants as well by helping trap moisture to protect your plants from drying out indoors as well.
For plants that need to be kept moist, this can give you a layer of backup to help protect your houseplants.
7. Repot your plants as needed
Keeping your potted plants from outgrowing their pots is important. Keep your pots properly reported and split as needed to keep them from becoming root-bound or not having enough airflow to prevent mold and mildew. Plant in pots in a size larger than the minimum.
8. Use quality potting soil
The better your soil the happier your plant will be. Choosing a well-draining soil that holds onto moisture well and has plenty of nutrients to help your plants grow is important for keeping your houseplants alive. Very few plants can survive in containers using everyday soil from outside but instead, need soil designed for potted plants.
9. Get to know each of your plant’s needs
To keep your house plants alive you need to know about the needs of each one. Some house plants are easier to care for and can be neglected and still thrive indoors while others are a lot more work.
Not knowing what your particular plants need when growing indoors is the main reason houseplants die and many indoor gardeners give up.
10. Set reminders to care for your plants
It can be very easy to forget to water or fertilize your houseplants. Unlike animals that will let you know when they have unmet needs, your plants are relatively unhelpful in their care.
Setting digital reminders is a great way to ensure that you never miss timely care of your houseplants helping to keep them alive.
11. Prune your plans to keep them healthy
Pruning plans helps to keep them healthy by removing dead material and improving airflow. follow directions for pruning your specific plants to help each plant healthy.
Each plant’s pruning needs are specific and this is another great reason to know about your individual plant’s needs.
There are a number of reasons why houseplants die. But if your plant is on the brink, these 11 tips can help you get it back into shape and keep it alive for years to come!
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