My Best Plant Care Tips
Indoor plant care tips from a plant store owner, and continuous learner. I jumped into the plant store business rather quickly. Read more about why I opened a plant store and how we went from the normal plant people owning about 20 indoor plants, jumping up to 60 indoor plants, and then to owning a plant store with hundreds of plants in inventory. That is a lot of plants to take care of. I learned very quickly which plants are truly easy indoor plants and which are not. I am usually a fast learner and this time it was super-charged fast-track learning and literal growing.
I have hear often from many of the plant experts I follow, books I have read, IRL plant people I have interviewed, that we were all sadly to admit- at one time plant killers. We all had to grow our green thumb by experience and by sheer passsion for plants.
If you are new to indoor plant and have the desire to bring more nature into your world, you can do it! It is like any self-care practice, you have to learn what works and what doesn’t. I say all the time- self-care is plant-care- basic needs are basic needs- thriving is different from surviving!
These are general guidelines I have learned and follow. Of course, every plant is different. If you bought a plant from my store more, it is going to follow these guidelines because I only try to carry easy, stylish houseplants that I know myself and other can take care of easily. I will keep this updated as I learn more.
Indoor plants like to be root bound. Don’t go up in pot size too quickly. 1 inch pot larger for repotting at a time.
All of my plants have been repotted with my miracle happy houseplant blend. I have seen if the soil gets too compacted the roots are not happy. Give the roots space to breathe. You want to always make sure the roots have drainage. This is the number one killer I have seen for indoor plants.
Underwater vs overwatering. Damage from underwatering vs damage from overwatering is easier to repair in my opinion.
Keep the leaves clean, wipe them down regularly.
As you start getting more plants, you will probably get gnats. The hydrogen peroxide remedy has worked best for me so far. I haven’t had them in store, but have in our home personal collection.
When you do water- water thoroughly, let water run out the drainage then stop.
Stick your finger in the soil to see if it is dry. Some plants want dry all the way out, some want to stay slightly moist bottom inch of soil. The ones that want to stay moist will usually tell you by the leaves. Succulents want to dry out and their leaves will tell you by shriveling if needing water.
When you figure out your plant water needs do that exact thing on repeat- for example full watering or 1 cup watering very 10 days. Indoor plants like consistency.
Dead leaves are ok. Many plants shed leaves as they grow. If it’s ongoing you need to access what is wrong and adjust, but normal leaf loss is ok. If the plant is growing very ‘leggy’ it’s looking for more sun.
Plant fertilizer is excellent. I will link some of my favorites. In my experience, I don’t do fertilizer in self-draining pots. At least the ones I have done did not do well.
You can use the compass on your phone to determine the lighting direction in your home or office and go from there.
Plants need light. Grow lights work great when needed as a supplement.
