You Grow Girl™

Back in June I purchased a gorgeous and rather large Staghorn Fern for a meager $5.99. Of course it was too good to be true and it turned out that my plant was infested with scale insect. Teach me to buy on impulse without a proper inspection.

But my sad story had a happy ending. I cut off the leaf that was too far gone and diligently hand inspected and removed scale everyday until they seemed to be under control. For the remainder of the summer my plant happily thrived under the canopy on my deck.

But alas my happy ending had a quick turn of events. At the end of the summer I brought all the indoor plants back inside to their winter home. Soon enough I started to notice the odd scale insect showing up on the leaves. I strongly believe that all disease and pest problems start with a bad environment. This is the approach I take to all matters of health, whether it be flora or fauna. Drugs and sprays mask problems. Change the environment and the problem will fix itself. Sometimes things go too far and nature needs a little assistance but even in the plant world there are lots of less intrusive helpers.

I know the problem has to do with bringing the plant indoors from an ideal situation to a less then ideal one. All summer long the plant had the perfect combination of humdity and dappled light. But then I brought it indoors to base board heating and dry, dry, dry conditions that even a non-stop humidifier and large aquarium can't seem to combat. Neglect resulted in a plant that dried out ever so slightly just a few times too many. Plus I wasn't keeping up on my daily inspections.

So this week I decided to start getting serious. One of the fronds is turning yellow, a sure sign that the scale are having their way with my plant. First I gave it a good shower. I even have a dechlorinator on my shower which makes it good for my plants as well as my skin. While I was at it I threw in the Urn plant, the orchids, the tillandsia and the cardamom plant. During the shower I picked off any scale I could find hiding in crevices under the leaves and the shield frond (the crazy looking fronds at the base). Then I let the plant alone for the weekend.

Today when I did my inspection I was happy to find two new fronds developing from the base. I was unhappy to find lots more scale. But that's to be expected. The thing with scale is that just because you can't see them, doesn't mean they aren't there. There may be eggs or there may be microscopic babies present that are just too tiny to see with the naked eye. So I'm waging full on battle now. I'm working hard to keep the humidity where it needs to be, but I need to get rid of the bugs. So I'm trying rubbing alcohol now. I'm tentative about burning the leaves so I am using rubbing alcohol diluted with water. I've dabbed it on a few places with a q-tip and am waiting to see if the coast is clear to try more. We'll see what happens.

In the meantime I have a cardamom plant to repot. It's not happy in it's current container which I think is too small and is constricting the roots. I'm hoping to go to The Royal Agricultural Winter Fair this week if I can find anyone to go with me. For some reason no one thinks looking at giant pumpkins, prize-winning produce and butter sculpture can amount to a good time. People they always have bith the tillandsia and the bulb booths. I'm building up my tolerance for such booths now and find my resistance growing stronger everytime I encounter them. I bet I'll walk out of there with an orchid though.

Previous entires about The Royal Winter Fair:

November 2001
November 2000