To want a houseplants that just bloody lives

[Purplerayhan]

That's all. No matter how much I read the instructions and follow them, source from proper garden centres, read up on the best plants for the room THEY JUST KEEP ON DYING. Even a sodding cactus went to the great compost heapnin the sky. I see other people's rooms with lush plants and I'm jealous.
And yes, I do have other things to be thinking about. No, I don't have much of a life. Yes, I talk to them but th singing might have finished them off.
Grrrrrrr!
YABU - clearly you're the Harold Shipman of horticulture, suck it up
YANBU - they are bottomless pits of promise and money, get over your hatred of plastic flowers

[CrazyCatLady13]

[quote NotJosieGrosieAnymore]@WinoLino that is a beautiful display!

Is the one in the brown pot a fern? I think I need to go up a few experience levels before I can attempt ferns.

Does anyone have experience of Lithops/living stones? Got some from Amazon so may not have been great specimens to start with, but now they seem to be precariously treading the fine line between life and death....not quite there yet but I’m scared one more watering will finish them off. I do love them though.[/quote]
Lithops do look dead, then bounce back, they need a dormant season where you don't water at all.

[Chunkymenrock]

Oh god, I can't bear indoor plants. Pots of mud in the house? No thanks!

[katewitch]

@NotJosieGrosieAnymore step away from the lithops! They have a super precise watering schedule and need zero watering over winter, give it a google

[Alann01]

I have a strange obsession with Venus flytraps it's the only plant that seems to survive in my house

[NotJosieGrosieAnymore]

Thanks everyone, I shall get on Google now and do some Lithops research. Got them for someone else (very plant savvy) as a Christmas present but they arrived looking completely cruddy so decided to keep them. Prepared to do whatever it takes to avoid another Calathea scenario!

[NotJosieGrosieAnymore]

I’m worried about the wrinkly bits but they look generally ok right?!

[katewitch]

@NotJosieGrosieAnymore they need more sun! That's why they've grown elongated, they're not supposed to do that

Stop watering for now and move to s sunnier place if you can and they may well make a comeback

[katewitch]

(My 6yo DS has lithops but they need to live in the kitchen as his bedroom is north-facing)

[NotJosieGrosieAnymore]

I see! Thank you! It’s tricky as our house is east-west facing so we don’t have a south facing windowsill to put them on.

I’ve put them in the conservatory which has more all-round log and will forget about them for a while.

[NotJosieGrosieAnymore]

*light

[katewitch]

No problem, fingers crossed they thrive for you!

[WinoLino]

@SBAM and @NotJosieGrosieAnymore yes that's my small Boston fern and I have a bigger one too which I've photographed.

To be honest, I'm not sure what I'm doing right with them, I've only bought them from decent places so that helps and also I spray them every few days which I think they love

[ShinyMe]

I had an emergency speed run to Wilkos last night for pots, and I can tell you that they have POTS at super cheap prices. I got a pretty gold shiny pot for £4 that makes my sad spider plant look quite glam, and a small pinky purple gradient pot for the baby tradescantia that I'm propagating for... £2? maybe £3. And I got some super cute teeny tiny thimble sized pots that I'm going to use for crochet plants (that's another thing I've got addicted to recently, making tiny crochet plants. I have made a couple of (5) crochet monsteras, a crochet pilea and a crochet spider plant, ooh and a snake plant.)

[NotJosieGrosieAnymore]

Well at least crochet plants are guaranteed not to snuff it! Sounds like a very good idea ☺️

[yamadori]

The best tips I can give are:

Find out where the plant lives in its natural habitat in the wild, and try to replicate that environment as much as possible. Alternatively, work out what growing conditions you can offer, and choose a plant that can cope with it.

Get into the habit of picking the plant up and feeling how heavy it is. Then you will be able to tell whether it needs watering or not, just by feel.

Never let the pot stand in water for any length of time. Roots need air as well as water, and waterlogged roots will just rot.

Watering to a regular regime doesn't work. Their requirements will vary depending on the season and the ambient temperature. I water the pelargonium on my west-facing kitchen windowsill once or twice a day in hot sunshine, and at the moment it is overwintering in an east-facing cool spot, and I haven't watered it for at least three weeks. Last week I watered my aloe vera for the first time in about 6 months.

Don't feed a sick/struggling plant thinking it will perk it up. It won't, in fact feeding at that time is more likely to kill it, not less.

House plants and radiators do not mix. Nor do they appreciate draughts.

[LakieLady]

@AllDoneIn

Weeping fig. They are immortal. You will pray for it to die. It will outlive you.

True. I've got one that has looked close to death since 1993. I kept moving it to try and find a spot that suited it, and it just dropped leaves all over the place and looked about ready for the compost heap.

When the window fitters came just before Christmas, I kept moving it away from wherever they were working and it ended up on top of a cupboard in the bathroom. It seems really happy there, is shooting out new leaves and looks all glossy and shiny.

I've decided it can stay there, rather than go in the bin.

[Purplerayhan]

Killed one of those too
It's clearly a skill

[ShinyMe]

Here are some of my crochet ones.

[jaffacakesareevil]

Get an app called Planta, honestly it's fab. It does all the hard work for you. Half of my plants have had new growth since I've been using it, amazing since it's winter.

[ShinyMe]

And some more.

[Purplerayhan]

An, they are soo lovely. You should sell them on test!

[Purplerayhan]

Etsy, No test

[NotJosieGrosieAnymore]

Shiny those are lovely!

And i literally just downloaded Planta! 😂 Very impressed so far!

[Whatsnewpussyhat]

I reckon I could even kill a crochet plant
They are lovely though.

[BigSkyLife]

With all this plant talk, could anyone identify this inherited plant that we are trying to revive?