How to stop root rot in your indoor plants

An indoor plant that is going backwards has usually been loved too hard rather than forgotten, and nine times out of ten what you are looking at is root rot. The roots have sat in wet soil long enough to start breaking down, and by the time the leaves go yellow and the whole thing looks tired the damage is already under the surface where you cannot see it.

What root rot is

Healthy roots are firm and pale. Rotted ones are brown, soft and they smell, and they pull apart between your fingers. It happens when roots sit in waterlogged soil with no air around them, so the two things that cause it are watering more often than the plant wants and a pot or a mix that will not let the water out.

Step 1. A pot with drainage holes

This is the one that gets everybody, because the nice pot is almost always the one with no hole in the bottom. You can still use it. Pot the plant into a plastic nursery pot with holes and drop that inside the pretty one, and then the water has somewhere to go and you can lift the inner pot out to water it.

Step 2. Empty the saucer

A pot can have perfect drainage and still drown a plant if it is standing in a saucer full of water, because the mix wicks it straight back up. Water the plant, let it drain for twenty minutes, then tip the saucer out.

Step 3. The right mix

A general premium potting mix suits most leafy indoor plants. Cacti and succulents want something much sharper and free draining, so they get a cactus and succulent mix rather than the standard one. If a mix feels heavy, or you know you are a heavy waterer, stir a couple of handfuls of perlite through it, which opens it up and lets air back into the root zone.

Step 4. Check before you water, every time

Push a finger 2 centimetres into the soil. Dry, water it. Damp, walk away and check again in a few days. That one habit prevents more root rot than everything else on this list put together, and it takes about three seconds.

Step 5. Match the water to the light

A plant in a bright spot is working harder and using water faster, so it will want watering more often than the same plant in a dim corner. Move a plant and its watering schedule moves with it, which is the bit people forget.

Step 6. Repot when it is time

If water pools on the surface and takes an age to soak in, or roots are coming out the drainage holes, the mix is spent and the plant is ready for a bigger pot. Slide it out, have a look at the roots, cut away anything soft with clean secateurs, and pot it back into fresh mix.

If it has already happened

You can often save one. Take the plant out of the pot, wash the old mix off the roots under a tap, and cut off every root that is brown and soft, back to firm pale tissue. Trim some of the top growth off too, because a plant with half its roots gone cannot support all its leaves. Repot into fresh mix in a clean pot, water it once, and then leave it alone and keep it on the dry side while it recovers.

Shop related products

Did you know we also stock the pots and saucers in the shop, including terracotta pots and saucers, plastic saucers from 330mm up to 500mm for the big ones, and hanging pots. They are not on the website, so give us a ring on (08) 8536 4333 to check what is on the shelf.

The mixes and the plant food are in the garden centre, and if you bring the plant in we will have a look at the roots with you and tell you straight whether it is worth saving.

More from the garden

A finger in the soil beats a watering schedule every time, and it is free. Ask me in the shop, I am usually there.

Cheers,
Candeece

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