Sorry for the lack of picture for now, but I think you'll be able to help without a picture. I bought an 8 inch pot of Hedera helix about 4-6 weeks ago. It's pretty nice and bushy, but these past couple of weeks I've noticed that leaves in the center of the pot have begun drying out completely. What it up with that? I'm usually pretty careful with watering... could I be UNDER-watering them? I've been letting the soil dry out between waterings... I suppose that could be wrong. Overwatering as a cause is pretty much impossible. I'm just confused why the leaves in the center are dying first.... shouldn't the outside ones be the first to be affected by lack of water? Hmm. Other info: - I haven't repotted yet since buying, I thought I'd give the plant some time to adjust. The pot seems adequate for the size, and has good drainage. The plant never sits in water. - When I bought it, it had little baby leaves in several places, which have not developed at ALL since then. Is this still due to the change of location, you think? - the pot is near a window, but only one side gets medium filtered light; the other side has pretty low light. It's a variegated plant.... could it need more light? - I mist the plant every day, since the humidity in my apartment is rather low these days. Please help! I never thought I'd get into ivies, but I've kind of grown attached to this guy, heh.
the soil medium it's in is most probably peat moss - when that is allowed to dry out completely, it becomes hard as a rock and then future waterings don't really get to the roots properly. i suggest unpotting the ivy and gently removing as much peat from around the roots as you can - then put the roots in a bowl of room temp water for a bit and then swish them around to remove any bits that are stuck on the roots (you want to be as gentle with the roots as you can and the heavy water treatment will soften the peat enough so that it can be removed without too much damage to the roots). then repot in regular potting soil - maybe some perlite mixed in. give it some time to recuperate from all the upheaval and it should be fine.
Ivies are known for getting spidermites, so with this type of plant, it's best just to keep an eye out:)
agreed, bluewing! i was going to mention them as being the issue except the description given sounds exactly what happened to the variegated ivy i had - it definitely was a soil/water uptake issue. i didn't have spider mites at the time. NOW i have spidermites...nasty lil pain-in-the-tush they are, too!!
Thanks, you two!! =) I'll wait for the warm weekend to change the soil... if it's not rootbound, I'll keep it in the same pot. After reading up on it a little bit, I moved it a little closer to the window.... it should get medium filtered light almost all day now, but when my blinds are up, a few of the branches are actually exposed to direct sunlight for a couple of hours. Do you think this would be harmful, or can the ivy take it? Also, misting should help with spider mites at least a bit, right? =)
Hate those darn mites! Just something to be aware of on ivies... Sorry to hear about your problem Joclyn. I hope you can get those buggers under control:) Out of "three" different ivies I had, "three" became infested with mites. Very frustrating! I think mealies can sometimes be easier to get rid of then mites, and mealies are about the worst to get! The only way I could get rid of the mites (or so I thought) was to put the plant out doors for the summer, but, when brought back indoors for the winter and only after a short time, I swear I could hear a bunch of little voices yelling, We're Baaaaack! Ugh!!!
Update: I tried to change my watering routine to see whether that would help, but I think you were right: with that soil in there, I couldn't tell how much water the plant was getting. I followed your advice and repotted into regular potting soil yesterday, and it already looks a little perkier. I had to remove a bunch of brown leaves again, which has been the case every week so far.... so I guess I'll see if it looks any better next week! Thanks for your help, guys! =)
I don't think the issue is water, or mites. I think the issue is light. No plants are truly evergreen, in the sense of keeping all their leaves forever. Plants routinely shed leaves. In this case, I think what is happening is that, since you brought the plant home, it has gone from a bright greenhouse environment to an ordinary home setting where it receives low-level, directional light. Those old leaves at the center of the plant aren't getting enough light to pull their weight (so to speak), so the plant is doing what plants do; it is shedding them so as to refocus its energy on outer leaves that capture more of the (limited) available light. You instinctively have done the right thing by moving it closer to the window. Good call! As the plant settles into its new home, you'll probably see other differences in its appearance. New leaves may be larger, and possibly darker green, and will orient themselves to face the window unless you make a habit of rotating the plant now and then to maintain a more rounded shape. New shoots may be longer and somewhat "stringy" looking -- again, this is the plant's way of reaching out for the light. It's all kind of cool when you think about it.
Bluewing, you're a prophet. I don't know if it was the innitial problem, but now I definitely have them: SPIDERMITES!!!! So gross. =( And it's a pretty big plant... I don't know if I have the patience to try and get rid of them... it's so hard to get ALL the undersides on ALL the hundreds of leaves.... I might just take a few cuttings every day for a while, clean them thoroughly and put them to root in water to start a few new smaller pots, seems like those are easier to keep in check. Grrr.
frauleinlayla. No prophet:) It's just something ivies can suffer with unfortunately.... I have had three different ivies in the past, and each one became infested with mites, so I stopped buying them. You'll want to make sure your ivy is not close to any other plants, or they can became infested as well by way of webs, hands, clothes etc.... Oh yeah, it would be a task and half to try to get rid of them, or trying to at least keep their numbers down on a large plant, so a smaller plant might be the way to go if you really want to keep some of it going. Swishing cuttings around in some semi soapy water should kill any that are on the cuttings, for a while anyway.... Putting your ivy outdoors in bright shade, a little sun, will help keep it mite free from the outside humidity, at least for the spring/summer & fall months.
Thanks, Bluewing. I don't have a place to put it outside, but I can run my humidifier right next to the ivy (and the plants that have been near it). I suppose that'll help a bit. I'll let you guys know how it goes!
you can use a humodifier, or the pebble tray with water in it an misting it every day.....guess it depends how lazy you are versus how much money you have, lol!
Haha, this is my humidifier... not the most professional, but awesome and silly, and it gets the job done!
No, that would have been preferred, it was actually a pretty sad dream :( You should youtube a video of the steam coming out of the pig's ears!!
Aww, sorry about the sad dream! But to cheer you up, I just found this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wxmko1cwl2A It's a frog, not a pig, but it's the same line of humidifiers. This one must be standing near a draft, cause usually the steam doesn't blow forward like that. I usually don't have it going at full power. It's really convenient and works well. =)
They are sooo good! They have all kinds of animals... I"m pretty sure they also have an elephant, and a penguin I think. I've seen them around at Target and such.
