Still a bad houseplant mother!

image from Clipart Library

I confess that my poor houseplants have been somewhat neglected since I had a rush of blood to the brain, and did a mahoosive bout of repotting back in 2020😧 I shall be repotting them all again over the next few weeks, though, so be prepared for a sprinkling of sorry-looking houseplant posts 😉 I've decided that this time around, though, I must be more disciplined and draw up a care schedule.  After all, four years is a very long time to go without fresh compost or even occasional feeding, with just erratic sploshes of water to stave off death!

This ctenanthe has been languishing on my dining table for a number of weeks now, waiting to be divided and repotted.  It belongs to Beverly's friend, Laura, and is one of the divisions from my "mother" plant.  I have to say that Laura has looked after it magnificently, unlike my care of my own poor ctenanthe divisions!

It was time for it to be repotted, though, so I said that I would do it and divide it at the same time.  As I say, that was some weeks back but it got put on the back burner with all the family stuff that was going on.  Anyhoo, last week I finally got round to sorting out the greenhouse (more on that in another post!), so I had work space in there to repot Laura's ctenanthe that she has been very patiently waiting for all this time 😊 

When I got it out of its pot, the roots weren't as congested as I had thought they might be.  The compost was very dry, though, despite me being mindful to water Laura's plant even if I neglected mine!  I decided to divide it into just four new plants, although to be honest I could have made many more smaller ones. 

One section went back into Laura's original pot, with the other three going into slightly smaller ones.  She took two sections for herself and one for Beverly.  I kept one piece for myself ~ I now have three ctenanthe and am not too sure where this new one will actually live😄

They weren't exactly thrilled at being manhandled, to be honest (the plants that is, not Laura and Beverly😏), but as mine is settling down now I'm hoping that the ones that have gone to the girls will be doing likewise.

 

Laura collected the three plants that were destined for Kirkwall last Saturday, and she brought me a lovely bunch of pretty pinky-red roses as a "thank you" gift 😊  The Sweet Williams to the right of the roses were a birthday gift from our friend Phil; they have lasted incredibly well as my birthday was on 6th June, and are only just starting to look a little tatty!