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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think houseplants are a complete pain in the arse

123 replies

kitteninabasket · 11/08/2024 23:45

My two monstera are out of control. The stems are massive and grow every fucking direction but up. They look NOTHING like the ones on Pinterest. I also get random mushrooms popping out of the soil.

My two monstera adansonii are ridiculously fussy. Their leaves curl up if I'm even one minute late with their watering. After I water them they sweat water droplets from their leaves which have stained my table. One of them has just developed some sort of spotty leaf disease and I'm tempted to let nature run its course.

My succulents are all stretched out and look shit.

My orchid's leaves got scorched in the sun so that looks like shit too now.

I've had three fungus gnat infestations. The bastard things were everywhere. They liked to hang out on my roller blinds which are now ruined from when I've opened them without checking and they got crushed into the fabric.

Am I just crap with plants or are they this much of a pain in the arse for everybody?

OP posts:
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MrsPelligrinoPetrichor · 11/08/2024 23:47

If you water from the bottom you don't get flies/gnats.

Succulents,chop them off and stick the ends back on the soil and they'll re grow.

TheChosenTwo · 11/08/2024 23:50

I don’t have any! I hate them, I don’t have green fingers and they are just something else to have to look after 😂

AppleDumplingWithCustard · 11/08/2024 23:58

I hate house plants so I don’t have any. I’d rather replace fresh flowers every week.

RainBow725 · 12/08/2024 00:02

YANBU. Plants belong outside in my book!

Lilyhatesjaz · 12/08/2024 00:03

You have my sympathy.
We have dozens of them, DS came home with another 5 last week.
He fortunately looks after any belonging to him but DH has started buying them to
They are taking over the house I have put some out in the garden for the summer.
I bought some sticky things that go in the pots to catch fungus knats they are quite good and reduced the numbers. Don't let anyone get Carnivorous plants to eat them or you will end up with 9 like me.

Doingtheboxerbeat · 12/08/2024 00:07

I love the look of them, which is why I have fake ones - the real version would die a long slow death .

Didimum · 12/08/2024 00:07

I love mine, they add such joy to my rooms, but I don’t have many. A monstera, a calathea, a snake plant, a cactus of some description and two other unidentified ones left by the previous owner years ago.

You can be pretty robust with trimming and training monstera. Don’t let it outboss you! You’re in charge.

Orchids are always a fool’s game IMO.

kitteninabasket · 12/08/2024 00:08

Lilyhatesjaz · 12/08/2024 00:03

You have my sympathy.
We have dozens of them, DS came home with another 5 last week.
He fortunately looks after any belonging to him but DH has started buying them to
They are taking over the house I have put some out in the garden for the summer.
I bought some sticky things that go in the pots to catch fungus knats they are quite good and reduced the numbers. Don't let anyone get Carnivorous plants to eat them or you will end up with 9 like me.

Oh yeah, the sticky things, another reason houseplants are shit. My cat got one stuck to his tail which resulted in him running around in circles miaowing while I tried to remove it as gently as possible. I eventually got nematodes which got rid of them all but I live in fear of them coming back. One of my plants really needs repotting but I don't want to introduce new soil in case it's infested with eggs.

OP posts:
JumpstartMondays · 12/08/2024 00:09

Doingtheboxerbeat · 12/08/2024 00:07

I love the look of them, which is why I have fake ones - the real version would die a long slow death .

Same! Occasional dusting and that's it!

RogueFemale · 12/08/2024 00:11

Get a few pelagoniums (sometimes called 'geraniums' but they're not). Ideal houseplants. No fuss. Flower year round.

https://www.woottensplants.com/pelargoniums/

Pelargoniums - Woottens Plants

https://www.woottensplants.com/pelargoniums

kitteninabasket · 12/08/2024 00:12

@Doingtheboxerbeat are fake plants decent these days?

You can be pretty robust with trimming and training monstera. Don’t let it outboss you! You’re in charge.

Orchids are always a fool’s game IMO.

@Didimum Oh, so you're supposed to train them? Do you trim the stems you don't want, right down to the bottom?

Ironically my orchids generally do well and re-flower, but I still can't seem to avoid the leaves getting a bit wrinkly. I was so pissed off when my latest one got scorched.

OP posts:
mathanxiety · 12/08/2024 00:17

I have two dozen, various plants, all going strong. The succulents I bought about ten years ago are all sorts of odd shapes now.

No orchids though. I tend to kill them.

SSpratt · 12/08/2024 00:18

i only stick with houseplants that survive with minimum effort. The old favourite, the spider plant is probably the easiest and it is a joy to see the babies growing. Good for your air quality too.

Judystilldreamsofhorses · 12/08/2024 00:20

I have black fingers. People keep buying me plants. Our lovely cat had to be pts earlier this year and my manager bought me a beautiful orchid for her. He took out the instructions - presumably because they had the price on - and I diligently watered it to death.

I finally put it out of its misery, and my friend came round for dinner with another one in a gift bag a few days later.

We have steps in the garden leading up to the grass, and they are like a graveyard - each one has a pot from a gifted/deceased plant on it.

My MIL gave me a cutting of lily of the valley a few years ago which I planted then forgot about. Not only has it thrived, it has (?) self seeded into a new plant. I need to dig it up because our new cat eats everything and will surely chomp it next spring.

Caerulea · 12/08/2024 01:10

I might have something of a small houseplant issue. DH & DC think it's quite a big problem but they are wrong so...

Succulents need maximum, MAXIMUM, light else they etoliate (stretch) looking for it. As pp said, top it & put the top back on soil & it will root dead easy.

Orchids are evil.

Fungus gnats are wankers but harmless & usually due to long-time damp soil. Careful with the sticky traps - I had a tiny bird fly down my chimney & get stuck in one, it was horrendous. But I got it free & released it then binned every single sticky thing. Never, ever, put them outside. If the plant can handle it you can let the soil fully dry out & they can't survive.

Monstera need stakes - as with everything else on social media, do not believe what you see.

The adansonii are guttating 😍, I've got pothos & alocasia that do it too & honestly I love it lol. But yeah, annoying if it ruins furniture. I know if mine are dripping cos my kids will moan about my plants pissing on them.

In answer to your question? Yes, they are pita & you either love the hoohah or you let them die of spotty leaf disease cos they deserve it. I've got one huge umbrella tree that I've left to die to scale, a silver sword philodendron that went directly to the bin cos I spotted thrips on it, a global green pothos that's been in isolation for months & a petulant maidenhair fern that mainly gets sworn at & I'm sure it's just pure spite keeping it alive.

PinkSunsetSky · 12/08/2024 01:18

I love my house plants and feel fondness for them 😁
I am very proud of my cheese plant which now has many variegated leaves.
I use little stakes to prop up
its sideways growth.
I also rotate its pot so each side gets the sun.
I’m not sure if the exact type that are in my hall but they look good / on trend and I have kept them alive for over a year.
Disclaimer: I hate gardening and have zero plants outside except well maintained grass.
I think I am a good houseplant mum though.
😆

JMSA · 12/08/2024 01:22

I don't have a single one. It's yet another thing I'd have to look after. Except unlike my children and dog, I can't keep them alive Grin

I do enjoy nurturing the plants at my work though.

NeverDropYourMooncup · 12/08/2024 02:09

The Monstera need staking and if you're feeling particularly brutal, chopping off a nice lump with nodes/air roots and sticking back in the pot (or another, to then present to somebody else so they also have an Audrey II to squawk 'Feed Me!' at them). You''re getting mushrooms and gnats because you're overwatering them. If they aren't fenestrating, they need to be in better light, maybe boosted up rather than at floor level.

The Adasonii are being overwatered, hence the guttation and going mouldy.

The succulents are etiolating because they aren't in good enough light and the orchid is in too bright a light; put the succulents in front on the windowsill and mostly forget about them, the orchid behind or on a northfacing windowsill and mist, rather than soak - they're meant to grow on pretty much fuck all in the shade of other plants, not be kept in soggy moss or completely ignored.

They aren't a pain in the arse, you just need to know what they actually need, which for the succulents is light and the occasional brief dunk in water, drying out in between, the orchid, benign neglect, and the others, less water and to be helped to do what they want to do, which is scramble up something to get to the light.

Said by the person who now has six Snake Plants, a crassula tree, three trailing crassula, an avocado tree, a Monstera that was 3 inches high and reduced to clear in Waitrose just after lockdown that is 8 foot tall, about 30 cacti, two pots of tumeric, one of ginger, tradescantia all over the place, 3 yuccas because DP kept buying them because he thought he'd killed them and their Lazarus-like recovery, some random thing that he thought was a spider plant but went from 4 inches high to three foot and enough spider plants to form a small army. The fuckers just keep growing.

ETA: Shit. Forgot the random thing that appeared on my desk at work that's now four foot tall. And DP's fern that turned into four plants after the cat knocked it over.

Caerulea · 12/08/2024 02:53

NeverDropYourMooncup · 12/08/2024 02:09

The Monstera need staking and if you're feeling particularly brutal, chopping off a nice lump with nodes/air roots and sticking back in the pot (or another, to then present to somebody else so they also have an Audrey II to squawk 'Feed Me!' at them). You''re getting mushrooms and gnats because you're overwatering them. If they aren't fenestrating, they need to be in better light, maybe boosted up rather than at floor level.

The Adasonii are being overwatered, hence the guttation and going mouldy.

The succulents are etiolating because they aren't in good enough light and the orchid is in too bright a light; put the succulents in front on the windowsill and mostly forget about them, the orchid behind or on a northfacing windowsill and mist, rather than soak - they're meant to grow on pretty much fuck all in the shade of other plants, not be kept in soggy moss or completely ignored.

They aren't a pain in the arse, you just need to know what they actually need, which for the succulents is light and the occasional brief dunk in water, drying out in between, the orchid, benign neglect, and the others, less water and to be helped to do what they want to do, which is scramble up something to get to the light.

Said by the person who now has six Snake Plants, a crassula tree, three trailing crassula, an avocado tree, a Monstera that was 3 inches high and reduced to clear in Waitrose just after lockdown that is 8 foot tall, about 30 cacti, two pots of tumeric, one of ginger, tradescantia all over the place, 3 yuccas because DP kept buying them because he thought he'd killed them and their Lazarus-like recovery, some random thing that he thought was a spider plant but went from 4 inches high to three foot and enough spider plants to form a small army. The fuckers just keep growing.

ETA: Shit. Forgot the random thing that appeared on my desk at work that's now four foot tall. And DP's fern that turned into four plants after the cat knocked it over.

Edited

I like the sound of your house very much indeed

dottiedodah · 12/08/2024 02:57

How I agree OP! Years ago I bought a cheese plant 🪴 for our 1st home.went to water it ,crawling with maggots! Horriified

I threw it away. NEVER again. DM was always buying African Violets .they didn't take much to life in London thogh!

coxesorangepippin · 12/08/2024 03:06

Try an allotment

Black tomatoes anyone??

Catsmere · 12/08/2024 03:49

TheChosenTwo · 11/08/2024 23:50

I don’t have any! I hate them, I don’t have green fingers and they are just something else to have to look after 😂

Same! The few pot plants I've had all died fairly soon - geranium, succulent and cordyline. Totally agree about one more thing to look after. It's quite enough to look after my DCats. That's another thing - so many house plants are dangerous to have around cats. Looking after plants is not a skill I have, nor one I wish to learn.

Houseplanter · 12/08/2024 04:28

I love them!

I've moved on to propagating them and giving to friends. It's surprising how easy it is to make new plants.. some are expensive to buy but quite easy to propagate.

WiddlinDiddlin · 12/08/2024 04:43

Oooh plant talk..

My little bambino alocasia zebrina finally surprised us with a new leaf last week, no idea how he snuck that out without anyone noticing, after months of the same number of leaves, all with brown tips 🙁

His big buddy Marvin Monstera is going absolutely fucking NUTS in the humidity - both are in our bathroom (wet room), and Marvin needs a chop to get rid of some of his crappier leaves, and I really should split him but I have nowhere to put his offspring..... is it really bad if I don't?

And how can a 4ft plant suddenly produce a huge and very nicely fenestrated leaf seemingly overnight, outta nowhere?!

I'd like him to grow across the ceiling so its like showering in a jungle eventually!! Not sure how practical that actually is though...

Otherwise, all my other plants live in the frog tanks, behind glass and seem to thrive on severe hair cuts, frog poo, dead flies and they do get misted multiple times a day... but otherwise neglected as its the frogs I look after (the judgey little bastards, tapping their toes at me to feed them).

Twistybranch · 12/08/2024 04:50

I have a maidenhair fern….. it’s a complete diva! Needs sprayed every day and watered every second. If you forget about it, it shrivels up quickly and never recovers. Totally unforgiving. I’ve had this one 1 year but will see how much longer it lasts.

Peace plant, amazing. Could forget to water for weeks but will still survive if you give it a good water .