House Plants

DIFFERENT than the gardening thread (which I also love but think of it as OUTSIDE plants) I thought I’d start a House Plants thread!

Are you a yay or nay for house plants?

Indoor plants are enjoying a HUGE insurgence of interest. Very popular from the teen/young adult and 30’s and up crowd. Even macramé hanging plant holders are back in popularity!

I think my 32 and 23 year old daughters have a higher quantity of houseplants now than pieces of clothing. LOL. And now I’ve caught some of the bug.

I’ve been enjoying some propagating of D2’s plants since she was home for 4 months recently doing a clinical rotation. This weekend I’ll be planting a monster she/we successfully propagated.

In February inspired on a trip to a local greenhouse I bought a citrus plant/tree. It’s a calamondin tree and I’ve harvested a couple fruits. Hardening it now so that it can live out on our deck this summer (it’s an indoor/outdoor variety) https://www.fast-growing-trees.com/products/calamondin-orange-tree?variant=13940824277044&gclid=Cj0KCQjwsqmEBhDiARIsANV8H3YTPlth1lZ9x6RyYtYjeDWF5iWza1aHQUJHaaRVbnpBpJuoyKFwFesaAtaQEALw_wcB

Do you do houseplants? Have favorites or those you are most successful with? I’m a plant nurturer indoors and out and enjoy “visiting” each plant personally on"Saturate Sunday" my weekly watering day. :slight_smile:

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We do houseplants but it’s mostly the common ones, Aloe, Snake plants, Pathos, and African Violets (my love, but we only have one window they do well in). We also have a small Palm that lives inside during the winter and out in the summer, but it might be its last year as it’s growing too big. When the kids were here we did Pineapples grown from those we bought at the store and ate. That was fun, but I don’t do it on my own.

Then last year my son finally found a source online for Purple Kings, so he bought me some “root.” It came up last year - still waiting to see if it will come up this year. My grandmother had tons of these inside and she gave me some of hers, but sadly it died when we moved to PA and I never replaced it. I’ve never seen anyone else grow it, nor seen it at any plant store. I’ve always loved the plant/flower so have my fingers crossed that mine will emerge soon.

Otherwise, we travel too much to have too many indoor plants - and I know I have to accept some losses, esp when we spend a month or more of the winter down south. I’ve replaced my African Violets a few times due to farm sitters watering them too much. Purple Kings would be able to handle it since they’re dormant over the winter.

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Baa humbug… my local-ish 32 year old daughter is not into plants. She agreed to take only one while we are on cross-country road trip. Normally I don’t have house plants, but when my mother died last summer I took the potted geraniums she had at her apartment (on windowsills and under grow light). Some of them had “summer vacation” in the ground, and others stayed in pots (but were outside). I brought all back indoors, plus one of my own from yard, for winter. There are a few more pots now since I propagated new plants/

It’s too early to plant them, though I tried a few. We decided to distribute pots amongst friend and neighbors for “babysitting” chores. I think mom would have liked spreading the cheer. A few have started to bloom, and I’m hoping others will do so too.

Here is photo of kitchen plants. Some are already planted or loaned, so no longer any under grow ilght in den.
IMG_2253

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We have had Christmas cactus inside for some time now. And, over the Christmas holidays, my wife always grows paper-whites.

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We have a calamansi tree in a pot in front of our window. It produces lovely smelling flowers (just like orange blossoms) and very small orange colored citrus fruits with sweet skin and tart flesh.

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Ha! I’ll be the Debbie Downer on this one. My Dad grows plants. We always had all these plants that just looked unkempt and downright creepy to me as a kid. I hated walking by them. The feeling has carried over into adulthood. I have zero desire to have plants. H says they didn’t have plants because their cats would eat them and barf them up. Good enough reason/excuse for me!!!

I also don’t garden. Working outside gives me no pleasure either. I like being out in nature. But working with it? Nope. To each their own!!!

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I’ve tried. I just can’t grow anything inside. So far I’ doing alright w/ my few annuals outside but anything inside??? forget it!

I just buy cut flowers occasionally from Trader Joe’s. It gets me by. :woman_shrugging:t3:

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@CTmom2018 that sounds like mine - any tips for fruit production? I’m feeding it a fertilizer the greenhouse recommended - last month I had LOTS of flowers though I also understand all don’t be come fruit and even some fruit that starts to (barely) develop the plants ejects.

I don’t strive to be a major plant lady or have a living room that looks like a tropical forest, but no doubt I’ve learned that a couple well placed (and potted) plants can really brighten a room. We also have lots of windows so pretty good natural conditions to grow.

As a kid all I really remember were my mom having African violets (not a fav of mine) and at some point - college maybe - I had basically pothos (though we called it philodendron) and of course everyone was sharing spider plants. I also had a jade plant decades ago - pre-now popular succulent times!

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A big Peace Lily, a few orchids (all are blooming now), three plumerias, monstera, olive seedling, coffee bush, two cacti, a Bird of Paradise, and some others I probably forgot. Seasonals include amaryllis. My cats when they were new to us destroyed the giant pothos I used to have, so I gave up on having another one. I moved the bay leaf plant and hibiscus outside because they were magnets for pests, but hibiscus did not survive this winter.

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I REALLY want an olive tree!!! I just love the look of them.

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My husband likes the houseplants. Frankly, I could do without all of them. He takes very good care of them…if they all died tomorrow, I would not care.

We have a peace Lily, a philodendron, a Christmas cactus that has never bloomed a second time, an orchid that was doing fine until I think broke off a new stem it was sending out, and some variegated thing that looks like a rubber tree plant but the leaves are variegated.

And…my husband is convinced he can keep last year poinsettias alive for next Christmas.

The only plant indoors now that I actually like is a blooming hydrangea I bought around Easter. I am hoping to keep it alive until it can be planted outside.

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I have lots of house plants, some have been around for 30 years! My favorite are my scheffleras. My mil gave me our first one as a cutting before we were even married. It’s enormous now and has been cut back a million times otherwise it would be even bigger. It has had “babies” and many friends and other family members have grown offshoots from it. Very, very hardy and tolerant of almost anything. It sat on a moving truck for nearly 2 weeks in the middle of the summer down south and looked like it was dead and within a week it was back and thriving

My D loves succulents so we have some of those too.

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Lol, I guess I will have to snap some pictures to post later. :slight_smile:

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I’m wondering if that’s a snake plant you have that is variegated.

What a fun looking plant!!!

I have about 20 houseplants. I added them one at a time after our major remodel four years ago. My husband gardens outside but not inside. I don’t know what mine are called, I just buy what I like. Mostly from Trader Joe’s and Home Depot. We have solar tubes in our kitchen which the plants absolutely love. So if they are struggling I give them a few days there.

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Oh I love houseplants and have had them for decades. Right now I have several including 3 which will be moved outside for the summer. My favorite is my lemon tree- S bought it for me several years ago and except for 2019 I have “harvested” 1 or 2 lemons each year. The small yield makes up for it in the large size of the fruit - they are almost always grapefruit size! I post picture on FB.

Neither of my kids showed any interest in houseplants while they lived at home. But we visited D and SIL recently and D now has more plants than I do. She says it’s a millennial thing and I just laugh.

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Yeah, we didn’t have plants in the “olden days”… :wink:

Is it months for a lemon to reach ready to harvest???

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@abasket it does take several months. Right now I have several blooms. Many of them will just fall off but a handful typically start to develop fruit. Of those, only one or two make it. They grow steadily larger over the summer and then take a while to ripen (usually in November or so).

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