Plant health
Start with what you see. Each page tells you how to confirm the cause, how to fix it, and how to stop it coming back.
These are general guides. For a personal check of your own plant, photograph it in Flora: the health check tells you what's wrong and what to do. Get the app
Symptoms
- Yellow leavesYellow leaves on a houseplant usually mean overwatering, but thirst, low light, pests, hunger and plain old age look similar. How to tell which one it is, and what to do.
- Brown tips and edgesBrown, crispy leaf tips and edges usually come from dry air, uneven watering or salt build-up from fertiliser and tap water. How to tell which, and how to stop new ones.
- Drooping leavesA drooping houseplant is thirsty or its roots are in trouble, and the fixes are opposite. How to tell them apart, plus cold, heat and repotting shock.
- Leggy growthLong, bare stems with small, widely spaced leaves mean a plant is stretching for light. How to fix it with light and pruning, and turn the cuttings into new plants.
- Leaf dropSudden leaf drop is usually a houseplant reacting to change — a move, a cold draught or a swing in watering. How to find the cause and help it settle.
- Root rotRoot rot kills more houseplants than anything else. How to recognise it, step by step how to cut it out and repot, and how to make sure it doesn't come back.
Pests
- Spider mitesFine speckles and thin webbing on your plant mean spider mites. How to confirm it, the treatment that works (and why it needs three weeks), and how to keep them away.
- MealybugsWhite cottony tufts in leaf joints are mealybugs. How to remove them with rubbing alcohol and insecticidal soap, including root mealybugs, and keep them out.
- Fungus gnatsSmall black flies around your houseplants are fungus gnats, breeding in damp soil. How to break their life cycle with drier soil, sticky traps and BTI.
- Scale insectsSmall brown bumps on stems and sticky leaves mean scale insects. How to scrape them off, treat with horticultural oil, and why it needs several rounds.
- AphidsClusters of small green or black insects on new shoots are aphids, one of the easiest pests to clear. Here's how, and how to keep them from coming back.
- ThripsSilvery patches with tiny black dots on leaves mean thrips. They're persistent: the treatment plan that works, including the step most people miss.
