I received a Ponytail plant a few months ago as a gift. The tips of it's leaves are turning brown. It's a small plant with four bulbs in it's pot. It has glued together rocks covering the soil so I cannot tell when the soil has dried out. Could I be underwatering the plant to make the leaves turn brown? I water it when I water the rest of my plants, which is once a week. Your help is greatly appreciated.
Pry the rock layer off immediately - how on earth can you water it (or judge dryness) that way? Those rocks are there only to have held soil in the pot during trucking to e.g. Home Depot, but are a menace. But in any case, you are watering too often (which is not to say you shouldn't give it a decent drink when you do do it). But the Beaucarna recurvata (proper name) are notorious for browning fronds, so unless you have perfect conditions (very gritty soil with no peat, tons of intense sun all day, and high humidity, you may not have a lot of luck.
I agree with the removal of the rock layer. Water sparingly. The plant stores water in its bulb and can draw from this reserve during dry periods. Err on the side of dryness. I'm not sure the dry leaf tips is a problem. The plant that I have grows in a typical sand/peat mix and is healthy and robust but also has dry leaf tips. I've grown specimens in both high and low humidity and the result is pretty much the same. Personally I wouldn't worry about it. Whatever the medium, it should be fairly porous and not be wet.
Hi JK - Have you ever considered not using peat in your mix, but a more porous loam that's easier to water (and especially to dry), plus some grit rather than sand, which is so fine and can choke the roots eventually?
Hi Junglekeeper, what about removing the brown tips from the plant. Is that an option or will it just get worse if I were to do that?
I have a ponytail plant that has moss(?) on top of the soil instead of rocks. When the moss dries out, which is once or twice a day, I just spray it. There are three ponytail plants in the pot. This has worked for me for more than two years now. If I'm not mistaken, ponytail plants store water in the bulb. Mine has done really well from the daily spritzings.
Hi Mikki, So you don't water it at all, you just spritz it daily? I never thought about that. That's a good idea...if it works for me... =0)
The plant is currently in a position where it gets lots of sun and heat so there's no problem with the soil not drying out. In fact I have to give it a bit of water almost every day. I was somewhat liberal by saying a 'sand/peat' mix. The potting soil that I use is more porous as it contains other ingredients like perlite, and something akin to lava rock. I don't see a problem with cutting them off as they're already dead; if you make the cuts near the boundary but in the dead part, there should be no impact to the leaves.
I have 2 of these that are at least 20 years old, now. I purchased 3 each in little 1 inch pots for 20 cents each at a local grocery store. After having them for about a year, we obtained a cute little puppy which promptly decided they were good to chew on. I lost one, another mangled, another OK. I stuck the two back in the pots and they grew great...perhaps magically healed by dog saliva. Years passed by, never a worry. The tips naturally turn brown...dry...and eventually fall off, to be replaced with new foliage. Two children later...the kids now call one of the plants "Cousin IT" from the 1960's show The Adams Family. It is about a meter tall and wide and in a huge pot in the kitchen. I accidently brought fungus gnats indoors a few years ago after it's stay outside for the summer. After much frustration, I actually took a plumbers propane torch to the top of the soil...a little unorthodox...worked great. These plants are tough, and frankly, given all my horticultural mistakes over the past 20 years, they look very healthy. They can go for months without water, can tolerate sun, shade, cold, hot, indoors, outdoors, severe root trimming, every kind of soil mix, etc...I haven't been able to kill them yet. For those with a "brown thumb", you might want to give this plant a try. Browning of the tips of the leaves can, in my experience, be a result sun burn, too much fertilizer buildup, or just a natural process of foliage loss and replacement.
