What I learned today

After some serious neglect over the Christmas period, I finally decided to do something about the dying houseplants on the shelves in my office. Several of them have shed nearly all of their leaves and are looking like they are about ready for the compost bin. Due to the mess of the dried up leaves dropping everywhere I took them down from the shelves one by one and cut out all the dead bits. As I did this it became clear that some of them were very dry while others were soaking wet. The stalks on the ones in the soaking wet pots mostly just came out in my hand - rotted completely through at the base, while the foliage was still dried up. Some plants, however, were absolutely fine, and all of them had been watered the same amount at the same time. So I watered the ones that were dried up, drained the ones that were soaked, pulled out all the dead stuff, and tidied what was left. One of them had to go to the compost bin. Hopefully things will improve now and I'll have some fresh new growth soon.

So what have I learned today? Basically that just because several plants are in the same room it was a mistake to assume that they required the same amount of water. Because they were up on shelves and above eye level it was easier to just water them after dipping in a tentative finger to gauge moisture, rather than taking them down individually to do a more thorough appraisal of thier needs. In future I will make a point of taking each plant off the shelf in turn and taking a moment to assess its general condition and needs, before watering the amount required by the individual plant if necessary. Different plants require different amounts of moisture, and drainage, and this can only be assessed by proper inspection. Besides, its nice to get to know your plants personally!