Why have indoor plants?

    Everyone can benefit from having a few indoor plants, even if you don’t have a green thumb. According to Dr. Charlie Hall, Professor at Texas A&M University and Ellison Chair of International Floriculture, plants in your home and office help increase concentration and memory retention by 20 percent.  Studies demonstrate that plants have a calming effect. Any tasks performed in a calm state create greater accuracy and performance.
    Do I have you rushing out to purchase office plants yet? For those of you with green thumbs and those without them, here is a short list of plants for the office:
    —Mother-in-laws tongue or Sansevieria zeylanica.
    —Peace lily or Spathiphyllum species.
    —Spider plants or Chlorophytum comosum.
    —Rubber fig or Ficus elastic.
    —Devil’s ivy/Pothos or Epipremnum aureum.
    These plants are tough indoor plants with a range of light levels from low, medium and high indirect sunlight. Snake plant and Pothos require low light levels with the exception of Golden Pothos which likes bright indirect light. Peace lily and rubber fig require medium light levels. Spider plants require high light levels.
    With water requirements, snake plants, peace lily and spider plants like to be moist, not wet. The Pothos and rubber plants like to have the top two or three inches dry out before watering again. Then having their soil moist in-between. None of the plants listed above really need to be misted. The normal levels of home/office humidity should suffice.
    With fertility requirements, the snake plant needs fertilizer (20-20-20) in spring and summer and none in the winter. The peace lily plants that grow in bright indirect light will need fertilizer (20-20-20) every six weeks. Spider plants need fertilizer (15-15-15) every month during the spring and summer. Through the fall and winter months, they need fertilizer every other month.
    Rubber fig plants need a regular fertilization (1/2 teaspoon of 10-10-10) every three to four weeks during the spring and summer and no fertilization in the fall and winter. Pothos require light fertilizations (19-16-12) every three months from spring to fall. The fertilizer will have instructions as to how much to use per the size of the pot. The general rule is usually one teaspoon per gallon or as otherwise instructed on the fertilizer. Keep in mind that higher light requirements do not need more fertilizer. The indirect bright light provides what they need, most of the time. There are other things to factor in such as the number of cloudy days and office temperature.

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