 I Love having hanging baskets in my home because it fills in the empty corners of a room. A popular type of vine used for hanging baskets is pothos. The leaf colors will vary from all green, neon/chartreuse, green with yellow marbling to green with white marbling. In order to keep them looking new and fresh from the plant shop it needs to be pruned regularly and strategically. The key is being proactive and pruning before it looks like it needs to be pruned to stimulate new growth and maintain a full, lush look. If you keep up with pruning all you should need to do is periodically prune the longest vines back toward the soil line so at least one leaf remains. Prune about a quarter inch in front of the leaf so a new shoot has a little room to grow. This strategy allows new growth to start at the base of the plant so the entire basket will consist of full continuous vines. If you start to notice that there are gaps in the vine, especially starting back at the soil level, then the plant should be pruned more frequently to stimulate new growth. If allowed to keep growing, these vines with missing leaves will eventually make the plant look stringy and it will lose that fresh lush look. Additionally, if pruning only takes place in the middle of the vine there likely won’t be much new growth coming from the crown of the plant, and it will start to look sparse and flat instead of full and round. Plants can be pruned vigorously while they are actively growing. This is generally in the spring and summer months, but don’t go by the calendar. Instead, start watching for new growth in late winter. This is also an indication that you can start fertilizing if needed. Please let me know if you have any questions. There is a video on my IG page https://www.instagram.com/p/CKUH6fynqBw/ 💚 Lindsay
 Look for vines that have large gaps where leaves have been fallen off and identify the longest vines to determine what to prune. A general rule of thumb is to remove no more than 1/3 of the plant.  Prune all the way back to just inside the rim of the pot, making sure at least one leaf remains. This will allow the vine to produce a new shoot and a new grow from the base of the plant. This allows the top of the basket to remain full of leaves and gives it that 'fresh from the plant shop' look.
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 I have only successfully overwintered rosemary indoors once and I’ll be honest, it wasn’t in the best shape, but it was alive and lived to see another summer in Wisconsin. Many years of trial and error have allowed me to observe what works and what doesn’t and that is what I am sharing with you today.
Let’s start with getting to know the plant in its native habitat. Rosemary are native to the sunny Mediterranean where the climate is hot and dry in the summer but cool and damp in the winter. The best one can mimic this environment is how the rosemary will survive. The three ideal needs are a sunny location, cool temperatures, and humidity. It may be challenging to recreate cool temperatures but if you have two out of the three it should survive. It seems like the main reason rosemary come to their demise around January is because they get too dry. To be successful you will need to change your watering habits from allowing the soil to dry down to making sure it is always moist, but not saturated. I find that I need to water twice a week to achieve this; the first time I will water thoroughly so water runs out of the drainage holes, and a second time 4-5 days later lightly on the top of the soil if it feels dry. Humidifying the air is also essential. Now that temperatures have dropped and the heat is on, our home environment is very dry. I keep a cool mist humidifier within a few feet of the plants and like the overall humidity to stay around 45%. I have two plants that I am overwintering this year so let's see how it goes! If you have any questions I would be happy to answer them. You can find a link to this post on my social media and leave a comment there. |
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