Hi i am growing a Dicksonia antartica indoors, im new to these ferns, I live in the uk and at present it is winter, my fern is only young and so i have decided to grow indoors till the spring. I brought my fern two days ago all was going well till the leafs started to curl and now they are going very dry! i don't know why though, it was watered well when it arrived. Can anybody suggest why the leafs are curling and going very dry. Thank you for reading my urgent post.
Looks bad. Pot is tiny, needs a bigger one. Since it has gone south so fast implication might be it was damaged before being purchased. Too cold? Too dry? Too hot? Too wet? When the whole top fails like that a severe problem at the root can be expected, but since this is a thin- and delicately leaved rainforest plant maybe an unsuitable atmosphere or exposure was actually involved.
I can most certainly put it in a bigger pot, do you think the humidity may be wrong for it? should i try putting the fern outside with some winter protection? How can you tell if it does have a servere root problem will the fern give off a bad smell?, sorry for all the questions im just new to these ferns.
the humidity might be too low. try misting the fern a couple times a day. ...i don't think i would put it outside in the winter; it might be too much of a shock.
I've grown this species for years and every time the roots are too dry it does exactly what your photos show. My plant is now 8 feet tall but if I allow it to dry at all I'll be chopping of the fronds. Friends in Australia say they grow in swamps.
leaf kotasek - i have decided to keep my dicksonia indoors over the winter period as snow is expected. thank you for your advice, greatly appreciated. :) oh and also im misty 2 times a day but still no change yet :(
Photopro - Would you suggest that i water the dicksonia more? The reason for me not watering it so much was because i read that in the winter fall you should water only when soil is dry. my soil is moist quite a lot of the time. should i water at least every 3 to 4 days? Thank you for your advice im very grateful. :)
So long as the soil is damp you should be fine. In our atrium we find this plant needs tons of water in the summer but we water less in winter.
Ok thank you for your advice! it is very helpful! I did give the roots a check and these were very dry but the soil was moist from top to bottom is this normal for dicksonia's to be like this?
Try adding a couple of drops of dish washing liquid to the water. It actually makes the water "wetter".
Ok thank you for the information i will try that and hopefully get a good result from it. Fingers crossed anyway. Thank you once again for all the advice its most helpful.
