Here are few pointers to ensure watering savvy.
1.Your houseplants depend on you to survive.
I know this sounds rather too obvious, but once inside your home, away from natural rain containing nutrients and sunshine containing the right wavelengths to make food, you have a job on your hands.
But it's an easy and fulfilling job. All you need is one essential ingredient I call it the R factor :a feeling of Responsibility.
Too much R and you are not enjoying your plants. Remember the basic idea of having houseplants, they must bring Joy.
Too little R and your plants are ignored. An ignored plant will go though cycles of undercare, drying out until it droops and yells "save me".That is when your R goes up enough and you slosh water on the poor houseplant and hope for some revival.
2. Plants not only need different amounts of water, they need their own watering schedules
This is because historically all of your houseplants came originally from somewhere. The somewhere wasn't a nursery in Florida. It could be a dense lush forest in the Amazon basin, a high-up rocky ledge in Switzerland, or a desert region in Africa. Houseplants have a memory built in from their ancestral roots. And water needs as they grow are at the top of their primordial list.If you can, do spend a moment figuring out for each of your houseplants their natural habitat and compare it with what you are offering.Timely watering will result.
3. Frequency. Water isn't just water. Some succulents and cactus houseplants do like being thirsty and rot if their roots get too wet for too long.Some plants are semi-aquatic like peace lilies. Aquatics and semi-aquatics need a completly different watering amount and frequency and thrive when their roots stand in water.Looking back at where your plants came from,the desert cactus might get several inches of rain once a year,and your houseplants from the Amazon basin like bromeliads and orchids got a deluge daily with little time to dry out between waterings. So we need this aspect of watering to be part of your watering plan.
4. Action
If you have couple of houseplants, checking for dryness using your finger is fine. With a big houseplant collection, five minutes to make a plan is best. The plan is going to be flexible. Plants grow in summer, sleep in winter. Seasons and your interior climate change.You could start a watering schedule by listing all your plants according to watering frequency:weekly, every 10 days, monthly.Then simply put each category on a calendar or cell phone alarm.Once done, you won't have to wait for leaf droop to remind you.Or you could just wait to be reminded. Remember, plants should bring joy.
5. Water quality.
The water in your yard comes from the sky if you're lucky enough not to need a watering system. This is quite different from what comes out of your tap, but few people stop and think before pouring tap water on their houseplants.
Rain contains sulphuric acid and nitric acid. This alters acidity levels depending on where you live. East coast rain has a Ph of 5 to 5.6. West coast rain has a Ph of 3.8 to 4.8.Your local water treatment plant doesn't just let you have the pure stuff. Disease control requires your tap water to have additives and these make keep you safe, but could easily kill a houseplant. So what's in your tap water is a very interesting question. Chlorine or similar disinfecting substances are added to your tap water to keep you safe. But the levels which remain in your water depends a lot where you are. But best way to prevent chlorine damage is to let the tap water stand 24 hr. In a jug, the chlorine will dissipate and be safe. In winter it will also have time to return to room temperature so the plant won't be shocked by chilly water.
Comentarios