# Plant trouble. 3 Plants not growing well, need help.



## MonopolyBag (Jun 3, 2007)

Maybe you can help...
3 plants not doing well...

Adiantum hispidulum - Fern
Helxine soleirolii - "Baby's Tears"
Selaginella Kraussiana - "Gold tips"

*Adiantum hispidulum* - Drying of leaves. Is now kept inside at room temp heavily watered in potting mix I received in from black jungle. No browning, more just browning. Using tap water to water it. Minimal light but enough I would think for most plants.

*Helxine soleirolii* - Drying of some leaves, primarily problem with rotting of leaves. Kept inside in heavily watered pot using standard potting soil. I think I need a new potting mix with better drainage. Looks as if leaves touching soil rot. Need better potting mix ideas and better location for plant possibly.

*Selaginella Kraussiana* - Browning of tips and not growing. I use to keep it inside in potting soil, until I read online about it, now kept in my basement, cooler conditions, in a potting mix of Perlite and Peat moss with good drainage, kept cooler Next to a growing light, not directly under because I thought they may get TOO much light.


Let me know what I am doing wrong and best way to get these plants to thrive, I need them for my vivs eventually. So let me know. Ideal potting mixes, and lighting, temp, and water... My other plants I have seem to be doing fine.


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## candm519 (Oct 15, 2006)

Here is my fix which might help:

Better draining mix is almost always a good idea. Roots need to breathe.

For me, browning leaf tips means the roots are too wet, and the leaves aren't getting enough humidity. 

I would repot all three. The roots have likely partly rotted; remove anything that looks unhealthy, repot into a lighter mix or good clean sphagnum in probably a smaller pot. (I finally broke down and got a small bale of good New Zealand LFS ordered online. Good stuff, better and cheaper than the little bags from Home Depot!) Only water when almost dry to touch. (If it turns pale, that is too dry.)

Trim off the brown parts of the leaves--they will never turn green again, look ugly, and could be hoarding disease as well.

Put a baggy hat on each one, to create a personal terrarium, or place them in a shoebox with lid. When you notice new growth, gradually reduce 'hat-time'.

I would also make cuttings from the Helxine and Selaginella, just lay on top of damp substrate or sphagnum--or straight into your terrarium. Use Rootone if you believe in it. (I do; Harry suggests cinnamon). You could get more plants this way while the mother plant is in the hospital. Ferns don't take from cuttings unless you include part of the underground base or stem, with fiddlheads. Couldn't hurt to try.


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## MonopolyBag (Jun 3, 2007)

OK thank you. And I guess it is back to my backyard and time to get back to those plants, I only had a small half hour break form them... alot of work, well i try all of this...


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

I'd find some place to put them that allows for a constant and relatively high humidity. I've used extra tanks for this... some cling wrap or press and seal if you don't have a glass lid, and put it in a sunny spot but not in direct sunlight. The ambient humidity in the tank will make them a lot happier, stopping the curling and drying of leaves, and will help even out the moisture in the soil. By having them in too dry an ambient humidity, often the soil dries out fast, and they get a cycle of soaked to dry to soaked to dry when all they really want is some nice constant humidity and moist soil...


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## harrywitmore (Feb 9, 2004)

Let me clarify something in Ann's post about cinnamon. I do recommend it fro stopping rot as well as garden sulfur. I doubt it would help for rooting. Baby's Tears love water and constant moisture. Selaginella is sometimes tricky. It grows well for me in a variety of conditions. Some in fairly dry locations with lots of light. S kraussiana seems to like conditions as such. I have been nursing A macrophyllum this summer and it like hispidulum loves high humidity and draining soil. I moved it into the pace I'm renovating and it's doing better.


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## skronkykong (Jan 1, 2007)

I'm having the same problem with the batch of baby tears I ordered. I moved the last green pinch of it to a brighter location and it seems to be perking up. My Selaginella I divided into two chunks on opposing sides of the tank. One chunk seems to be thriving while the other isn't doing so hot. I can't figure it out because the conditions appear to be very similar!


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## MonopolyBag (Jun 3, 2007)

I set up some growing lights, and put most of my plants in tanks and covered with cling wrap. I hope this helps my plants.


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

Has it helped?


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## MonopolyBag (Jun 3, 2007)

Kinda helped... my Selaginella Kraussiana is dead, I ordered another from BJ hasn't come yet... and the Helxine soleirolii is almost gone... probably try to get these better but buy new ones for the vivarium... Why have these done so poorly? Should I be worried, or just try to keep them in the vivarium at all times...?


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

With the new ones I'd make sure to put them in the "vivarium" set up right off. The shock of the different in conditions likely had a lot to do with them not doing well. Give them a couple weeks in the temp viv and see how much they bounce back. I've had some selaginella that pretty much dried out and died, just to have it slowly come back after a few weeks in appropriate conditions. I actually had a syngonium sp. do the same thing... after "dying off" months before, I looked in my plantlet tray recently to find it already with 3 adult sized leaves looking like the "die off" never happened! Sneaky plants...


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## MonopolyBag (Jun 3, 2007)

OK Yeah, i'll be patient... Thanks. Hope the ferns comes back too, only got 1 leaf on that, the others dried up, browned and molded over and they were cut off right away.


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## KeroKero (Jun 13, 2004)

I'd remove the dead leaves, clip them close to the base, just to keep fungus in check, but keep them in that environment. My mom recently brought back some ghost ferns that had completely died down (drought), but they tossed out fronds again when they were kept moist again. Ferns are often pretty good about that.


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## MonopolyBag (Jun 3, 2007)

Two of my plants died off, but my fern is coming back! AWSOME!


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