Plant Diary | February 2021

Home » Plant Diary | February 2021
26.02.2021

It’s been about three months since my last house plant journal update, so I thought I’d share some recent photos. I briefly started a separate Instagram account for all things house plant related, but to be honest I am feeling a little bit overwhelmed by Instagram and I’m not sure keeping two accounts is something I want to do at the moment as I end up spending too much time in app which leaves me feeling distracted and irritable. It’s such a busy, noisy app, and really commercial what with the new shopping tab taking prime position in the user interface.

The Instagram plant community is really friendly and positive, but as with all hobbies these days there are also lots of influencers who make their money through product placement and advertising, and I am trying to limit my exposure to these things as I personally feel happiest that way. Despite my best intentions and awareness of behavioural psychology and the power of advertising, I’m human. It’s all too easy to see a beautiful plant I’ve never heard of and then think I need it when the reality is I don’t, and nor do I have the space or conditions to look after it properly. So, for the time being I will just share house plant things here on my blog. My collection is small, made up of common plants, and I have set a limit on how many plants I can keep at any one time to keep things from getting out of hand. The plants I have make me happy, and that is enough.

Hoya Memoria aka Hoya Gracilis

I am still growing things mostly from cuttings. I ordered some hoya memoria cuttings at the start of January but they sadly didn’t make it, I think they were cold damaged in the post. I tried again from a different seller once the weather had warmed up, and this time they have rooted and seem to be doing well.

Pilea peperomioides

My pilea is doing well, it’s putting out lots of new leaves at the moment and has stopped dropping the lower leaves now that I water it more frequently. I think I left it too dry for too long back in autumn as I was so worried I’d kill it through overwatering!

Maranta Leuconeura

This maranta came from the Botanical Gardens and it has put out three new leaves for me this winter. It seems to be quite happy.

Hoya Linearis

This pot of hoya linearis was grown from cuttings and they have all taken and started to push out some lovely new growth. It’s in a really chunky mix which dries out pretty fast, and my living room is quite cool at night which I gather the linearis likes.

Hoya Linearis
Hoya Linearis
Selenicereus Chrysocardium aka Fern Leaf Cactus
Selenicereus Chrysocardium aka Fern Leaf Cactus
Hoya Carnosa ‘Rubra’ aka Krimson Princess

We had a cold snap in late January and early February and because the apartment beneath ours is currently empty and not providing us with any secondhand heat, we ended up having to have the heating on for longer each day than we normally would. Heating means dry air, and my calathea orbifolia doesn’t like dry air. I put a vase over it to increase humidity for a couple of weeks and have been rewarded with a big new leaf without crispy, crunchy edges. It’s now too tall for the vase though, so we’ll see how I get on with it out in the open.

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