Saturday, November 14, 2009

Is my plant going to be OK?

While my roommate was moving out of my apartment, long story short, he dropped his bike on my croton houseplant. It had 3 woody shoots coming from the soil, but one of them was cut in half. I'm very upset about this. Will that shoot ever grow back? Do you know how I could help the croton with fertilization to produce another one? It's been with me for nearly 2 years, I couldn't stand to throw it away. Is there anything I can do? I'd hate to have to get rid of something I invested so much care and time into. Thanks.

Is my plant going to be OK?
I think it will be just fine, plants can recover from this sort of injury. What you could do is get some sharp scissors or secateurs and cut the broken stem back to the nearest leaf. This will remove any damaged tissue and prevent die back in the stem. Then just let the plant do its thing, pretty soon it will send out auxiliary shoots from the sides of the stem. You can remove any unwanted shoots at this stage so it will have as many branches as you want.





In my opinion, houseplants do not need to be fertilised at all, they benefit more from being re-potted into fresh soil every few years. But if you really want to fertilise use a slow release during the plants growing season and be extremely sparing.
Reply:Why, yes, it should be just fine. It'll take it a little while, but, yes, it will grow back, just as if you pull the end off of a leaf (of a living plant of course) it will grow back.


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