When you talk about watering
houseplants and the proper way to do that.
Plants are going to need water as part of
their natural growth and life cycle.
But not all plants are going to need the
same amount of watering.
Most of them need to be
watered so that the soil
is allowed to dry out
slightly in between waterings,
but for most of the time it's going to be kept
more on the moist side.
Some exceptions to that are going
to be cacti and succulents,
which because of their very nature,
don't need a lot of extra water,
and so they're not going to need to
be watered quite as often.
Or plants, such as orchids,
which are also watered quite infrequently,
not nearly as much as
most tropical plants would be in the home.
Couple of ways to figure out when the
plants are going to need to be watered.
Number one, feel the weight of the pot.
As the soil dries out on that plant,
that pot becomes much lighter.
Another sure way to figure that out
is to just feel the top of the soil.
And you can usually feel if
it's going to be dry.
And that would be another indicator that the
plants need some moisture.
You want to avoid over
watering or doing it on a
regular schedule, because
the plants are going to need,
need water at
different amounts and different rates
depend upon the size of the
plant, what kind of pot it is in,
whether it's clay or plastic,
or how big that pot is,
that moisture is going to evaporate
or be used at different rates.
Couple of ways going about
watering would be
to water from the top of the container.
It's always a good idea to have
room temperature water and you want to water
thoroughly until the water begins to
drain out through those drainage holes.
It can sit in there for just a little bit.
But after about one hour,
unless all of that water has
been reabsorbed back into that root ball,
you want to be sure that you drain off that
excess so that that pot
doesn't sit in that water,
which is going to cause the,
the soil ball to be too wet
and the roots are going to rot.
Another alternative would be to
simply take that pot and set it into a
sink or set it into a bucket of
water for about an hour or
two and let that water go up by
capillary action again after
about that two hour period,
drain off that excess
so that that pot doesn't sit in
that water. For the cacti and the succulents
what's often used as a watering regime is
about every two weeks
during the growing season,
that's when they're actively growing.
Fall through winter, when they are dormant,
you want to avoid overwatering them at all.
You just need to give them a
sparing amount.
When we get to plants like orchids,
they also don't need a lot of extra water.
If you think about where orchids grow,
they are usually up in trees,
so they get a little bit of rainfall.
And so the rule of thumb
for orchids is to water,
about three ice cubes a week.
Now you don't have to literally put
the ice cubes on the top of the bark mixture,
but about that amount.
I mentioned the watering very thoroughly
through the soil ball
rather than just a little bit.
Now our water contains various salts,
and if you don't flush out those salts,
what often happens is
that you'll get a white crust that
develops on the outside,
particularly clay pots.
Now that crust develops
because of those salts that are in our water, but
also within fertilizers.
So you want to make sure that you always
flush that soil out completely
when you water. Speaking of
fertilizing. House plants
don't have to be fertilized. But
it's a good idea to give
them a little bit of
nutrition about every two weeks
during the growing season.
And it's a good idea to use a
soluble house plant fertilizer.
You would put that in your water and
then use it to water your
house plant as you normally would.
One other tip before
I finish here is that if you have
plants that are in decorative
containers that doesn't have any
drainage holes in it.
You always want to be sure that you
take it out of there to water
rather than just watering
while it is inside that container.
Because what happens is that water will
build up inside that decorative pot.
And once that plants sits in water,
those roots continue to rot and
the plants are not going to thrive.
So always take it out of
that decorative container and
either water from the top or move it to a
sink or to a bucket.