"I never, ever, in my life, believed that I would even spend two minutes worrying about house plants."
I never, ever, in my life, believed that I would even spend two minutes worrying about house plants.
But one day, I decided we needed some greenery hanging down over the top of our kitchen cabinets since our place is all black & white with no "pop", looked up some fake plants on Amazon and the thought crossed my mind that maybe we should try planting a few of those green vines that I saw out on the edge of the woods behind our old place. And so, the green massacre began...
It started off with the Arrowhead plants that I found at the edge of the forest. I was initially going to gather these at our old place but read up on them and found them to be toxic to dogs (and humans). Upon further research, we're mainly looking at ingesting them or handling them then rubbing your face.
I figured I would give it a try and keep an eye out for any leaves that look like they would die and fall to the floor. After having done so, the dogs just ignore their existence, so I don't see it as to being a concern.
Next came the idea that we'd get rid of the fake Areca palm that I've had since... forever, that no longer even looked convincing as a real plant, and get a live one. In my early 20's I probably went through half a dozen of the real versions of these--killing them all--reasons unknown. Underwatering? Overwatering? Not enough light in the living room coming in from the screened-in patio?
But now we have Google, and I can research this stuff and do it right. Right? So far, so good. Whew!
So, of course, you walk into a Home Depot, or any store, for one thing and your ADD kicks in and you see some Mass Cane that looks really "tropical" and proceed to find two of 'the best of the best' in the aisle and add them to your cart as well. Along with stylish pots, rock, some potting soil, and anything else you can fit on the cart.
Lucky me, my Home Depot card from 10 years ago expired and was discontinued and I spent about $75 bucks after it was all said and done via discounts for signing up for another Home Depot card that I'll never use.
The Mass Cane have been the easiest, by far, to maintain. They don't require a lot of watering, and they just sit still, remain alive, and listen to all of our stupid conversations.
So, when counting on our fingers how many plants we're now responsible for, we've got the original Arrowhead plants that we wanted to adorn our kitchen cabinets with, the Areca palm, the easy Mass Canes--what more could we possibly need?
Well, the Arrowheads turned into a plethora of Arrowheads, I think we've got 5 pots of them now with some in waiting in a "temp" pot of soil. But walking back from the accumulation of these Arrowheads something caught my eye crawling up a tree.
GOLDEN POTHOS!!!
These leaves are H-U-G-E!! They say that Pothos is an invasive species, but I beg to differ. They've been the hardest of all to keep alive. Maybe it's a communication thing. I'm trying to read their minds and nobody's talkin', so I have to experiment. I tried aerating in water (the only way they've stayed alive so far), potting them in indirect sun on our patio, and getting brave, putting them up in front of our front door with full sunlight which pretty much killed half of them.
These guys are my obsession now because they're playing very hard to get and I'm intent on figuring it out.
Update
Found an endless supply of Golden Pothos so the originals have been planted (again)--this time behind my office desk with indirect light via a bay window.
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About the Author
Currently a Lakewood Ranch, Florida resident, Philip has authored various interactive blog websites since the early 2000’s. Most content will be based primarily on matters of opinion as usual.
