Image – Wikimedia Commons / David J. Stang
Palm trees can sometimes have a few problems when grown indoors. Drafts from the air conditioning or fan, frequent sprays, poor watering … all this can make the leaves look ugly. Therefore, I wanted to show you the change so spectacular that a plant can give with just a few small touches.
It was the turn of a Chamaedorea elegansa palm tree that is widely grown indoors, but in hot climates it can also be grown outdoors. It is one of the easiest to take care of, as it is very adaptable, although the wind and / or air harm it when it is inside the house.
How to recover an indoor palm tree that is drying up?
If your palm tree has started to have more and more dry leaves, it is time to take some measures so that it does not go overboard. Therefore, I recommend you follow these steps:
Remove dry leaves
Without a doubt, the first step is to take the palm tree to the hairdresser. To the vegetable hair salon, of course. Jokes away, we have to remove all dry leaves or leaves that look very bad to give a new life to the palm treea new color, using scissors. If it is going to be more comfortable for you to remove it from the pot, as long as you can extract it taking the whole root ball with you, you can do it.
Transplant your dry palm tree to a new pot
We continue to give you a a little bigger pot the one that had to which we will add a new substrate, that is, that we have not used before for other plants. This substrate must be a mixture of mulch with 30% perlite, or the like.
To water
Once we have the palm tree in its new pot, it’s time to water it generously. To do this, we will fill the watering can, and until we see the water coming out quickly through the drainage holes, we will not finish watering. If necessary, tap the pot so that all the substrate is soaked.
Clean the leaves and stems
To finish giving a new look the palm tree, we can only clean the leaves and stems. I really like to use the Aloe vera wet wipes they use for babies, but you can use a cloth with soft water.
(OPTIONAL): water above dry palm trees
In case you do not trust that any chemical in the wipe is harmful to the plant, water it over. Thus, in addition, it will finish cleaning everything.
Enjoy!
Bit of a change, right? It’s not as pretty as when you bought it, but don’t worry, spring will take care of that. But yes, it does not hurt to treat it with systemic fungicide, since in that state it is vulnerable to infections. Thus, your palm tree will recover.
Why can indoor palm trees have dry tips?
There are many reasons why a palm tree, grown indoors, can start to run out of green leaves:
Air currents
Be those of an appliance (air conditioning, fan) or those that we generate ourselves when passing by plants, for example. If they are strong and / or constant, the moisture contained in the leaves is gradually lost, until they finally dry out. First it will be the tips, then these can be broken, and later, if the problem persists, the entire sheet will end up drying.
Therefore, it is important that they are not placed in busy areas. In case there is no other option, they must be at least one meter from the transit area. That is, if the corridor is about 3 meters wide, the palm tree will be placed about 15 centimeters from the wall, already about one meter from the center.
Sudden changes in temperature
You may think that this does not happen indoors, but … imagine that it is summer and it is very hot. You come from the street, where they are registered we will assume 35ºC. You get home and notice a drop in temperature: it’s five degrees lower. It is still a lot, so you decide to turn on the air conditioning, which is at 22ºC.
What is going to happen to the plants you have in that room? Well, they can dry. Even if your indoor palm tree is far from drafts, that drastic drop in temperature will make it suffer. Hence, it is not advisable to put it where there are these types of devices.
Low ambient humidity
Most of the palm tree species considered ‘indoor’ come from tropical forests where the humidity remains high, above 50%. Inside the house that only happens when you live on an island, near the coast or a river / swamp / lake; even within the same island for example there are more humid points (those that are close to the sea) and others drier (that are those that are further inland).
But assuming you live on the peninsula, far from the sea, the humidity in your area, and that of your home, will be low. And that can harm your palm tree, unless you do the following:
- Buying a humidifier and put it to the side;
- o fill containers with water and put them around the pot.
Another thing that will do well is to spray / spray its leaves with rainwater or water suitable for human consumption, daily if it is summer and the environment is very dry (with a humidity percentage below 50%), or on alternate days or every other day if it is winter.
It is very important that if the humidity in your area is high, DO NOT spray its leavesWell, you don’t need it. What’s more, an excess of humidity could rot these leaves. Of course, you can (and should) dust them with rainwater, distilled water, or milk, but beyond that, you don’t have to do anything else.
Can it be prevented that the leaves of the palm tree are dry?
Yes, of course. In fact, in addition to everything we’ve said before, it is necessary to keep the palm tree well watered. In general, it will be watered when you see that the substrate is drying, both on the top and on the inside. You can check the humidity of it with a meter, or with a wooden stick.
It is also very good to pick up the pot after watering it, and again after a few days. Dry soil weighs less than wet soil, so this difference in weight will help you know when it’s time to water again.
When you have to, pour water until you see it coming out of the holes in the pot. You do not have to pour a glass and that’s it, but you have to leave the soil moist, otherwise, roots may remain without the precious liquid. And of course, if that happened, they would dry, first they and then the leaves.
Another topic to talk about is the plate. Plants that are kept indoors are usually put a plate underneath, or even inside other pots that do not have holes. And that is often a mistake. The water that remains in the dish and / or in the bottom of the pot without holes rots the roots. Therefore, they should be avoided, or at least, if you put a plate on it, you have to get used to emptying it after each watering.
And nothing more. We hope it has served you.
