Authoritative Indoor Plant Care?
January 3, 2022 9:13 AM Subscribe
During the pandemic my indoor plant population has exploded into a gratifying hobby of beauty and magic. I have been using google to figure out the basics of temperature, sunlight, watering, fertilizer and soil, but this approach just seems so...random?
Is there a more definitive resource (book, website etc) that you can recommend?
There's an app called Planta that might help -- I haven't tried it yet (just ran across it in a rec list today), but it looks pretty amazing.
posted by humbug at 9:47 AM on January 3, 2022
posted by humbug at 9:47 AM on January 3, 2022
Best answer: I found this helpful, in that you should take care guides with a grain of salt.
Why is Houseplant Advice So Bad?
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:00 AM on January 3, 2022 [4 favorites]
Why is Houseplant Advice So Bad?
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:00 AM on January 3, 2022 [4 favorites]
Best answer: I highly recommend Darryl Cheng's website, House Plant Journal, and book, The New Plant Parent. I got into plants in a big way just before the pandemic and borrowed just about every house plant book from my local library. Cheng's was so good I bought my own copy.
A lot of books and websites and apps will tell you things like how much water and sunlight your plants need, but there's no such thing as one answer to this information. A plant that gets a lot of sun will need more water than the same plant in lower light conditions. I think we also vastly underestimate our plants' light needs. A "low light" plant in the natural world might get a few hours of direct, intense sunlight a day; a dark corner of our living room isn't "low light" as far as our plants are concerned. Also, some people who seem to have amazing green thumbs really just have a lot of big windows with southern light exposure. It's very easy to do well with plants in those kinds of conditions.
Here's one of the best sources of information on his website: Bright Indirect Light Requirements by Plant. From Darryl, I learned that I was vastly wrong about the light my plants were getting.
So, my advice is to read Darryl's work because he really breaks this all down in a way that makes a lot of sense.
posted by bluedaisy at 11:11 AM on January 3, 2022 [8 favorites]
A lot of books and websites and apps will tell you things like how much water and sunlight your plants need, but there's no such thing as one answer to this information. A plant that gets a lot of sun will need more water than the same plant in lower light conditions. I think we also vastly underestimate our plants' light needs. A "low light" plant in the natural world might get a few hours of direct, intense sunlight a day; a dark corner of our living room isn't "low light" as far as our plants are concerned. Also, some people who seem to have amazing green thumbs really just have a lot of big windows with southern light exposure. It's very easy to do well with plants in those kinds of conditions.
Here's one of the best sources of information on his website: Bright Indirect Light Requirements by Plant. From Darryl, I learned that I was vastly wrong about the light my plants were getting.
So, my advice is to read Darryl's work because he really breaks this all down in a way that makes a lot of sense.
posted by bluedaisy at 11:11 AM on January 3, 2022 [8 favorites]
And the piece linked by tiny frying pan is great, too.
posted by bluedaisy at 11:12 AM on January 3, 2022
posted by bluedaisy at 11:12 AM on January 3, 2022
The On The Ledge podcast has been super helpful to me and introduced me to this comprehensive resource - The Houseplant Expert by Hessayon. The only gap so far is the ZZ plant which was only commercially propagated starting in the 1990s.
posted by hydrobatidae at 11:51 AM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by hydrobatidae at 11:51 AM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]
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and I got these based on a MeFite suggestion, they are really helpful:
Ippinka Aquameter (sorry Amazon link)
posted by winesong at 9:34 AM on January 3, 2022