Houseplant Care

Growing indoors is not a topic we usually cover here at Gardenary, so I've gotten some tips from a real houseplant pro. Maria Failla, host of the Bloom and Grow Radio podcast and YouTube show, is going to guide us through three steps to success when we want to grow all the green things indoors, no matter what the weather looks like outside.

(Prefer to listen? Check out this podcast episode on Spotify here.)

Understand Your Natural Indoor Light

There are so many different factors that could affect your natural light indoors. Similar to an outdoor garden, a southern-facing window will have the most light in the Northern hemisphere, while a northern-facing window will have the least light. However, trees can create shade, so you really have to assess your light situation at home. I lived in several apartments in New York city where, yes, I had southern-facing windows, but I had huge apartment buildings right in front of me that essentially blocked all my light. I had the equivalent of a northern window, even though my GPS was telling me South.

Overall, plants need light. I frequently get questions like: “Can I put a plant in a bathroom with no windows?” And the answer is you can, but that plant is going to slowly die. Your best bet is to choose a plant that will die slower.

Fiddle-leaf figs, a notoriously picky plant, are a great example of indoor light needs. They have these gorgeous structural violin-shaped leaves, and you see them in every design magazine—but the interesting things is they're usually filling the space in a corner. But those fiddle-leaf fig trees need tons of light. They thrive in light, and we're putting them in the darkest parts of most homes. People are buying a $200 fiddle-leaf fig tree and putting it in the corner, where it looks cool for two weeks and then drops all of its leaves.

Equally important to understanding your natural light conditions is understanding the plant that goes with those light conditions. Fiddle-leaf figs don't belong in darker corners, but you might be able to get away with sticking a snake plant, a ZZ plant, or an ivy plant somewhere that gets bright indirect light. Those plants are low-light tolerant.

I like saying "low-light tolerant plants", not "low-light plants", because no plant is really thriving in low light, but there are plants that can tolerate it. Snake plants, which are some of my favorite plants, are always touted as the low-light plant, but snake plants actually thrive and even flower in high light. Because they tolerate low light, they always get put in these low-light situations. They never get to be where they really want to be.

Take Some Time to Assess Your Indoor Light

Use the compass on your phone and any one of the light measurement apps available. I have a free download on my website that actually gives you a worksheet and step-by-step instructions on how to measure the light in your home over the course of a week.

It's important to understand that even light from a southern-facing window is much less than the light availability you have outdoors because it's only coming from one direction. The minute you get a foot from that window, even six inches away, that light drastically reduces. 

Bright indirect light happens a lot quicker than most people think. Your succulents really need to be on a windowsill. Succulents on a coffee table six feet from a window aren't necessarily going to be set up for success. You might see some stretching, some etiolation.

Take Some Time to Understand the Natural Environment of House Plants

Most of the plants we grow as houseplants are tropical foliage plants that literally live in the rainforest. Most of them grow on the bottom of the rainforest floor, which is what makes them lower-light tolerant, but they climb trees because they're looking for light. Plus, a rainforest has 80% humidity all the time. In my previous home, we were at like 26 to 28% humidity every day, which isn't even good for humans, let alone plants. You're never going to be able to perfectly recreate those conditions that the plants really thrive in, but you can think about how they live and then try to replicate it. That will help them better acclimate to our environments, instead of setting them up for failure.

Another thing to understand is that these plants get rained on in nature. Indoors, dust tends to collect on the plant leaves rather quickly. We've got our air conditioners and heaters blowing dusty air all over the place. It’s really important to replicate that rain shower by either wiping the leaves to remove the dust or sticking your plants in the shower with you for a little rain bath once a quarter.

Get the Moisture Level Right

The thing with indoor plants is the containers they grow in are obviously much smaller than raised garden beds outdoors. Because of this, a high quality, airy potting mix for your houseplants is important. Never use outdoor garden soil in your indoor pots. That might sound basic, but some people think that you can just grab your shovel, take some of your soil from outdoors, and bring it in. 

Soil intended for outdoor use will not drain fast enough, which would set your indoors plants up for root rot like nobody's business. (I know because I'm totally guilty of doing that. No shame. No one can ever tell me anything they've done as a plant parent that I probably haven't already done.)

Outdoor soil could also bring inside fungus gnats and other pests that you don't want infecting the entire plant population in your house. 

The other thing that has helped me go from plant killer to crazy plant lady is using pots with drainage holes. So many of the pots that we buy at Anthropologie and CB2 and West Elm—these gorgeous planters that we all want in our house—don't have holes at the bottom. And people say, "Okay, we'll put a layer of drainage at the bottom and then plant the plant in there," but with a lot of these smaller pots, that layer of drainage actually makes it worse for the plants instead of helping them. In a large pot, it might work, but in a 4"- to 8"-inch pot, it'll just raise the level of where the soggy soil hangs out and increases your plant's chances of getting root rot.

What I suggest is either buy pots with drainage holes or, if you want to get the fancy CB2 pot (and believe me, I have plenty of them in my apartment), keep your plant in a plastic pot that has holes (like the one it came home in from the nursery) inside the fancy pot. When it's time to water, take the plastic pot out, let the water run through the bottom, and then return it to that hole-less pot. You'll set yourself up for so much more success and save a lot of heartache this way.

If you do have pots with a layer of drainage rocks at the bottom but no drainage holes, remember to be super careful how much you water. That water has nowhere to go at the bottom, and it's going to take so much longer to either evaporate or get absorbed by the soil. That's when you get fungus.

Set a Weekly Maintenance Schedule

Getting into a routine with your houseplants is beneficial on so many different levels.

Pests are definitely an issue indoors as much as they are outdoors, especially if a plant is stressed and maybe not in the right environment. Your plants are probably grouped nice and close together, without any external factors that might kill off those pests. If one plant gets a pest infestation, it can spread very quickly across your plants. Thus, keeping your eye on your plants is a really good idea. 

Check in on your plants in the morning just as a way to wake up. Maybe every Sunday is your houseplant maintenance day.

Once a week, touch every plant and take a closer look to check that they're all healthy. Make sure there are no aphids, no weird webbing (an indication of spider mites). Wipe the leaves that need dusting, prune any yellow leaves, and water the plants that need watering. This weekly maintenance routine should not necessarily be a watering routine because you should really only water the plants when they need to be watered. When you're indoors, that's going to look different season to season and plant by plant. 

The difference between a plant killer and a plant lady is getting to know your plants, and that only happens by spending time with them. There will be trail and error. You might lose plants, and that's okay. There's a lesson in every plant fail, and sometimes I think the failures are even more important than the wins in this hobby. Just keep learning.

Find Resources for New Houseplant Parents

If you're new to houseplants, I have a really fun, free quiz called The Plant Parent Personality Quiz. We'll send you recommended plants, DIY planting projects, and podcast episodes to help you get started. That's a really fun little thing to do to learn something about yourself and also get some great houseplant recommendations if you're looking for a place to start or maybe some different types of plants to add to your collection.

You can also find me at Bloom and Grow Radio on Instagram.

I'm excited to do some outdoor gardening now because I've got a big yard for the first time in my life and am inspired by Gardenary.