How to successfully grow houseplants Dick Martin

Life has changed a bit since that evil virus has invaded our lives. Most people are spending a good deal more time at home, so sales of garden seeds and landscape plants have mushroomed, and I heard recently that sales of garden tractors have more than doubled. People are turning their hands at building patios, too, or ordering windows, doors, and garage floors. Anything to keep busy and fill the endless days. So, it’s not surprising that purchases of house plants are up nearly 100 %, according to a study in Uswitch.com. House plants brighten a room, give color to jaded eyes, and help convert our carbon dioxide exhaling into oxygen again.

Unfortunately, many of us kill our plants almost the roots rot, and the plant droops and dies. To combat this all you need do is stick your finger into the pots soil. For some reason fingers are very sensitive to moisture, and if it’s dry they will tell you so, and send you reaching for a watering can. If that digit says the soil is moist enough, then just walk away. It’s a well known fact that winter plants are usually semi-dormant and don’t need nearly as much water as fast growing summer ones.

Different rooms in your house will have different degrees of heat and humidity, and with this bit of knowledge it’s easy to match plants to the room they’ll be living in. For example, our bathrooms often have higher levels of humidity and low light levels. It’ll usually be a smaller room too, and you might consider hanging plants to spare limited floor space. Good choices here are Mother in law tongues, Pothos plants, and ivy.

Kitchens are more often than not a bright and cooler space with high light levels, so the plants you choose should be happy on a well-lit windowsill, tolerant of higher temperatures and humidity as we cook, and much cooler at other times. For these, think Pothos plants, Spider plants, herbs, and maybe Aloe Vera. Bedrooms? Like our living rooms, our bedrooms do not often enjoy vast amounts of natural light, but are a warm, cozy space. Any plant you place in a bedroom will need to be the most tolerant of neglect because you don’t give them much thought during the day.

Good choices here are Mother in Law tongues again, along with bamboo palms and Philadendron. Some are called Lucky Bamboo, and they’re tough plants that look good, so good that you’ll often see them in offices. Untold pots of these thrive in awful conditions, rarely watered, and thriving in poor light and bad air quality. They live on and on. Don’t forget your living room, a place where plants turn up more often than in other parts of the house. House plants crave Dick Martin is a retired biology teacher who has been writing garden columns for over 30 years. You can reach him at richmart@neo.rr.com Gardening

as quickly as we buy or grow them, so we buy more, then these die, too. The trick seems to be that green thumbers need to learn just a few basic moves and grow or buy a few basic plants that can handle the dry atmosphere in most houses, or just pick plants that can handle almost anything. Luckily, there are some that fill the bill. Too many of us kill our plants with kindness by the common practice of over watering them until