this post was submitted on 09 Jun 2023
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Nature and Gardening

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All things green, outdoors, and nature-y. Whether it's animals in their natural habitat, hiking trails and mountains, or planting a little garden for yourself (and everything in between), you can talk about it here.

See also our Environment community, which is focused on weather, climate, climate change, and stuff like that.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Here's the view from the chair!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

great view!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

hi can I move in, thanks 💜

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Hahaha! Sure! I make a great cup of tea for hospitality :)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Wow, this looks beautiful! I'm super jealous

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I really love the chair shape and leaf throw. It really makes the space cozy

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I’m so jealous of your wall of plants!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Wow wow wow. This looks so warm and inviting! I love all the wood, too! (And the corgi, of course 🙂)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Testing a new iOS app. Please ignore.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Looks good and thank you for tolerating my test comment here. If you are curious, then I am beta testing Mlem for iOS.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That looks like a wonderful place to relax and de-stress from the outside world. I love it.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thank you. It really is a stress relaxer. It took a while to get everything set up for sure. This room has about 110 plants in it, most on the shelving on the wall opposite of the windows. I've got another 60 scattered in another room. I like bringing nature inside :)

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

170 plants?! and here I am feeling super overwhelmed with 7 of them, hah!

on a slightly joking but also sort of serious note: do you have spreadsheets to keep track of them all? is there a lot of variance in watering schedules, or do you have some auto watering..?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Honestly, I leave them alone most of the time. Check out the Planta app -- it's a watering schedule app that you input the conditions your plant is in, and it adjusts accordingly. Be careful not to take it word for word though, machines can only be so accurate and it's better to trust your own instinct on watering...for example it'll tell me my alocasia zebrina needs to be watered all the damn time but every time I go to check it the soil is still soaked, so I give it a while to dry out first. I use the app more as a reminder to check if the plant needs it, rather than to water without question.

Aside from that though, that's really it. I spend maybe 10 minutes a week watering. The upkeep is the only "difficult" part - trimming dead foliage, plants need repotting, getting appropriate sized pots for their root system, keeping the soil mixes to the plants needs, etc. Once you learn the specifics of the major species groups you can easily discern from there what a plant would do better in for soil. For example, alocasias need chunky well drained soil so I'm always sure to mix orchid bark in there with peat moss/coco coir. My carnivorous plants get a mix of no added fertilizer peat moss/perlite/sand/sphagnum because they're more particular. Likewise, my lavender plectanthrus is happy with anything so I put it in just standard potting soil mix.

I guess then there's pests you have to worry about. But.. That's a different subject lol.

Edit; I should also add I do have adhd so when I got into the hobby I didn't expect to go balls to the wall lol. I had one houseplant before and it was dying. Suddenly something flicked like a switch and I had 50, then 100, then 150.... yeah... but it turned out to be a nice hobby I think, because it really does help with stress and make you feel happy to care for and watch something grow.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Amazing, thank you for the detailed reply! I’ll definitely check out Planta - right now I just have scheduled reminders on my phone but they’re not really helping so far. Thankfully I think most of my plants are ok with a leetle neglect, and I’m… letting my Rufibarba go because we’re just not a good fit. 😅

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Hahah, I've killed two rufibarbas. My first one was due to a draft in the windows and the other one came with mites, and it was so bad I didn't want to f with it. I'm on my third and it's been a good relationship for about a year now :) they like humidity and their soil to stay very slightly damp-ish. I've noticed they don't do well in an area on their own....grouping plants helps here with the humidity, and calatheas are little drama queens so if you get another one, good luck!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

What a gorgeous room! Looks like the kind of place you can sit and unwind for hours in.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

This is lovely!! I aspire to have an indoor room like that someday.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wow that looks beautiful. Do you need to manage the humidity at all with that many plants indoors?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Thank you!

Honestly, grouping plants together helps tremendously with the humidity. There are a couple of them that will always need more (for example, it seems no matter what I do I can't keep my alocasia stingray or philodendron aurea thriving) but truthfully, I should be keeping those in a different environment anyway. Most of them are absolutely fine. During the winter it does get really dry in there (I'm in zone 4, so heavy and long winters) so I run a humidifier if it gets below 45 on the hygrometer, but it usually doesn't because they're all so grouped up.

I'm more surprised that my cacti seem fine with the humidity levels and never get signs of rot. I dont know if it helps but I keep all my dry/arid plants on one shelf, and my more humidty-needing ones grouped together away from the arid ones.

I have a thermo/hygrometer but it always seems to stay stable.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Oh wow, that looks amazing. Well done!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

What a cozy setup!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Omg, life goals.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’m so jealous! Do those shelves have lighting? The cacti look so happy!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Yep :) I used t8s (or t5s? I can't quite remember) for the shelves. I posted a photo from the chair view in the comments, maybe that will help picture them better. There's another shelf on the wall beside the chair that's kind of hard to see that has lighting too. Honestly if it weren't for all the lighting, I don't think half of these plants would survive.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Love the cute little doggie

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Thanks, that's Atlas! He's the biggest sweetheart (and asshole) I know.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Fantastic! Right down to the leaf blanket :)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Oh, wow... that space looks incredible. Almost meditative. I imagine it's a wonderful place to read, or work remotely.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

This is gorgeous!

But I demand more pictures of that dog!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Wow beautiful :)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Wow this looks incredibly comfy

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It looks lovely!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Well if that’s not the coziest looking place I’ve ever seen! So pretty!

[–] Crackhappy 2 points 1 year ago

The corgi really ties it all together.

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