#1108637 added February 18, 2026 at 8:11am Restrictions: None
Plant to Fail
I'm skeptical about a lot of things. Not denialist; skeptical. But there are a few things I'm absolutely certain of, and one of them is that plants die in my vicinity. Hell, one time I bought a cactus for my housemate. I never touched it. She was diligent with it. It died. So I don't believe for one second this article from BBC:
I thought about getting plastic plants, but I expect those would die around me, too.
Have you lost count of the times you've had high hopes for a pot plant...
However, this lede is the real reason I saved this article. High hopes? Pot plant? I get they speak a different language over there, but either they ignored their US editors, or this is one of those times when the BBC gets a bit cheeky. It does that sometimes. It's often subtle. So I'm hoping—really hoping—that this particular double entendre was intentional.
Still, in the US, we call them "potted" plants to distinguish them from weed.
...but despite careful positioning and diligent watering it always seems to die?
Every. Time. Full disclosure: I've never tried with an actual (snicker) pot plant.
Well you're not cursed and you don't need particularly green fingers for your to foliage to thrive, you just need to know where you might be going wrong, experts say.
You all know by now that I have no business with the supernatural. I mean, it's great as metaphor and in stories, and I enjoyed the long-running series by that name, but here in reality, I prefer science and reason. Still, if anything was going to pivot me to believing in curses and whatnot, it's the way plants die in my presence, as if realizing that they're stuck with me and have no legs to run away with.
But—rationally—my cats have legs and are stuck with me, and they don't try to run away. Except the one who gets medicine twice a day, but she doesn't run far.
Gardeners' World host Adam Frost and the Royal Horticultural Society's Clare Preston-Pollitt share their top tips for keeping your house plants alive and healthy.
Clare's last name is precipitously close to being an aptronym. Pollitt? Pollen? I'll be here all week.
Adam's is the polar opposite of an aptronym.
1. Pick the right plant
I don't want to seem ungrateful, here, but that's crap advice. As someone who appreciates form, but appreciates function even more, the only plants I really want to keep around are the ones you can use in cooking: mint, thyme, basil, etc. A ficus is useless and just takes up space. So I want to know how to keep, specifically, herbs alive, not some random spider plant that would look better in a vegan restaurant anyway.
Many of us pick plants we think are pretty but making sure they are compatible with the conditions in our homes is key for survival, says Clare, RHS Garden Bridgewater's horticultural advisor.
And if you live with pets, some plants are right out. Imagine me having a catnip plant. It wouldn't last a day. But, worse, some plants are outright toxic to pets, usually the same ones that pets absolutely love to munch on.
2. Don't overwater
Yeah, thanks. I suspect the problem here is the precise opposite, but "underwater" means something else entirely.
For common house plants like peace lilies and spider plants, brown leaves are a tell-tale sign of over or under watering. Check the dryness of the soil before topping them up.
For others, like cacti and succulents, Clare says we mistakenly drown them by unnecessarily watering them.
I am certain that this is not the case for the cactus I mentioned above.
3. Water less in winter
Some regions experience winter differently. Specifically, some never get cold, while others never get warm. I suspect this article was written with the temperate and moist UK in mind.
4. Keep your Christmas poinsettia warm
Remember how I said the thing about pets? Yeah, poinsettia and pets don't go together, despite being unable to spell "poinsettia" without "pets."
Also, even I know poinsettias are from Central America and Mexico. Which is one of those regions I mentioned in the last section. Exposing them to cold is like mixing good tequila with Sprite.
To keep them lasting longer than your New Years resolutions, you should add plant food to your poinsettias each month, Adam says. In April, he suggests trimming the branches, before re-potting in May.
And I'm including that bit to emphasize what I said up there about the BBC sometimes being cheeky. "lasting longer than your New Years resolutions," indeed.
I'm obviously leaving a lot out, but the link is there if you haven't yet given up on the entire idea of houseplants, like I have.
