Repotting Schefflera Arboricola

Good afternoon everyone! I have spring fever since this is the first full week of spring. About two weeks ago, I did purchase a 'schefflera arboricola' or umbrella plant and here it is:

It is a really nice and healthy plant indeed! But it is showing signs of it outgrowing its current pot so now it's time to repot. I do have a pot on hand as well as some soil. I did take the plant out of its current pot first:

This schefflera does have a very healthy root system, I'm really impressed. Next the roots did need to be loosened so that the plant can grow into its new pot:

Once this step was done, I did set the plant into the new pot. Be sure that before placing the plant into the pot, that 1/3 of the new pot is filled with soil. After placing the plant into the larger pot, I added some more soil around the root system and eventually filled the pot almost to the very top:

After this was done, I gave the plant a thorough watering to get the roots acclimated to the new growing conditions. Here's the finished product!

My schefflera looks very happy in its new home and completely ready for spring. Thank you for reading everyone and have a great Thursday!

New Philodendrons

Happy Friday! Lately I've been looking around for new plants to add to my indoor garden and I did in fact find some great plants too. Here's a philodendron scandens micans plant that I purchased last week:

Please excuse the background mess on my kitchen counter but it's adjusting very well. This is related to the philodendron scandens but the leaves have a very nice velvety texture which is very cool about this plant. It is starting to trail a bit already. My next plant is a philodendron scandens as well:

But this is the plain all green variety. 3 years ago in 2011 when I lived in Texas, I did have one like this as well. I really like the the glossy leaves which looks very beautiful. These are very easy plants to maintain and I cannot wait for vines to form. I did forget to mention that I did name my philodendrons. The 'micans' name is Pearl and the green 'scandens'  name is Jack. I hope that you have enjoyed today's post and thank you for reading!

Repotting Dracaena Marginata

Hello everyone, for today I will be doing some repotting sessions with my Dracaena Marginata plant:

I did purchase this plant a little over a month ago and it has made a lot of progress. I did buy this plant for only $2 because it was barely alive and it also had a lot of dead foliage. The plant did gradually bounce back to great health and I'm very happy. I am going to repot this plant into this really nice orange planter:

With this pot, my dracaena will have more space to thrive compared to its current pot. To start off this process, I took the plant out of the old pot to examine the root system:

The roots are in good condition which I am really pleased about! Next, a layer of soil is added at the bottom of the new pot to give space for future new growth of the root system to grow:

After this step, the plant as a whole is placed in the container:

In the last step in this repotting procedure, I added a top layer above the root system. If the plant is in need of some water, give a moderate amount of water to the plant. Here's how the plant looks after its repotting:

It's enjoying the afternoon sunlight and I'm excited to see how my plant will do in the following months. I will post updates. I hope that all of you will have a great afternoon! Thank you for reading.

Reviving the Corn Plant

Good afternoon everyone! I would like to share my new growing space for my indoor garden: 

I really like the windows and the high ceilings in this space. These windows face west which gets evening sunlight but there are tons of trees outside of my windows which filters out some of the sunlight. I am planning to fill the space with new indoor plants. Last week at my local Walmart, I did find a new plant and here it is:

This is a corn plant (dracaena fragans) which is a beautiful houseplant. I did receive a 50% discount because the plant has some structural damage as well as lots of dead leaves at the base of each stalk. In the process of reviving this plant, I took the plant out of its pot to examine the roots:

 The roots were in OK condition but they also had some signs of root rot. I did trim the roots of the dead and decaying material. 

Next, I did place the plant into a new pot and set it in front of the west facing window to help it to acclimate to the new growing conditions:

I am going to let this plant rest for while and let it get used to its new home. Since the soil was very wet, I did not add any additional water to the soil mix to ensure that the problem of root rot will not happen again. This is my first ever corn plant and I am very excited to see the results of this plant in the future. Thanks for reading! :)

New Beginningings 2014!

Hello everyone! It's been a really long time since I have made my last post but I'm back! A lot has changed in my life over this past year and a half. I no longer live in Texas, I moved halfway across the country to North Carolina and I'm adjusting here very well! Before I left Texas, I've found new homes for all of my plants. I am starting over on my indoor garden. I would like to have some new plants featured on this blog that I have never grown as a houseplant. I am planning to start some citrus seeds as well. There will be more frequent posts for now on and continue to read this blog and watch my new journey of gardening! Happy 2014!

Repotting Plants: Golden Pothos

Summer's officially here! This is the first weekend of summer so I did repotting of a golden pothos plant. I could tell that it needed repotting because it was wilting continuously and many roots that were coming out of the bottom of the growers pot so here it is:

Once I had my materials including the plant itself, a larger pot and new potting soil, I started this task. First step is to remove the plant from its pot which sometimes can be a little difficult if it is root- bound; if this happens you can just cut open the growers pot.

After that you have the plant removed from the pot, you can see all of the roots of the plant that were so squished into the previous pot. Next step is to loosen the root system or untangle them a bit to ensure that the plant can successfully grow into the new pot.

After untangling the root system, now its time to position the plant into its new container and make sure that it is secure by putting another layer of potting soil around the top and perimeter of the root system.

Now that everything is in its place, you can give it a thorough watering and let the excess water drain out of the pot and place the plant back into its original location, like my place that is close to a window.

Here's the finished product, where all of your work pays off! And this is a fun task to do also and let the plant grow and grow into a larger plant!

Heading To The Season Of Summer!

These are the last few moments of spring so I will like to share the progress of some of my plants that I am growing. First up is my african violet and here it is:

I did recently change it out of the ceramic blue pot and into this self watering pot which makes watering much easier and the plant seems a lot more happy. This is the same plant that I purchased in December and it is doing awesome. I water my plant once or twice a week depending on the day's length and it loves it. You can place an african violet in a north window that doesn't get very much direct sun, an east window which only gets some direct sun in the morning or a west window that gets afternoon direct sun. If you want continuous flowering, then give it african violet food every watering and with watering with this plant is not to get the leaves wet and that's all to taking care of these kinds of plants. Up next is my mother in laws tongue plant:

Sorry about some of the lighting issues in the photo above but my mother in laws tongue or sansevieria plant is getting really tall now. The tallest leaf is about 2 feet tall. I forgot to mention this plant on this blog when I first bought it back in the end of December 2011 and it was way smaller then. This plant can handle a lot of neglect or long times without water and these are really great for low light situations like a north or east window. This is a variegated plant with the yellow border around the leaves and these clean the air at night when you're sleeping so that's a positive too. And up last is a peace lily or spathiphyllum flower and here it is:

I bought my peace lily in February of 2012 and it was doing great then it started to decline a bit so I found out that the problem was the soil mix of the plant wasn't draining the water properly and rather not letting it drain that caused root rot. It was really sad that part of the plant didn't survive but thankfully I managed to save part of the plant before it was too late and it's doing awesome! It's gaining back it's health and is even flowering. Thanks for reading 8D