Top 3 Gardening Myths: Debunked

When you think of gardening you probably picture your grandma in an old beat up sun hat getting down on her hands and knees shovelling dirt all day. Well, I'm here to tell you that gardening has evolved since your grandma's time and it's now easier than ever. However, despite all the mental and physical benefits, many people are hesitant to owning houseplants. In fact, you might be surprised at these top three gardening myths that are widely responsible for this reluctancy.

Myth #1: You Don't Have the Resources

One of the biggest myths when it comes to gardening is thinking you need all this special equipment to sustain a plant. Wrong! Let's not forget that plants natively grow outside in dirty conditions, so you don't need all those fancy supplies. In fact, it's actually better if you use supplies you already have around your house because it's better for the environment in the long run.

However, there are a few things you need in order to grow plants in your room:

Space

Obvious but necessary; you can't grow plants if you don't give them enough room to grow! However, don't worry if you live in a small studio apartment with barely enough room for yourself, you can still grow some plants! Some of the best plants to grow in confined spaces are:

Snake plants, Succulents, Ferns, Bamboo palms, Philodendrons, Cacti, and Hoyas

Pots

Sunlight

Water

Are you surprised soil isn't a necessity? There are some plants you can grow entirely in water!

Myth #2: You Don't Have the Time

A common misunderstanding people have about plants is that they take a lot of time to care for. Wrong! Depending on what you think a long time is, most plants only need to be watered weekly or bi-weekly. This means a solid 2 minute shower for your plants once a week or twice a month is all you need to keep them happy and healthy.

Here are some tricks I've learned as a busy college student to help keep my plants healthy with minimal amounts of time and effort:

Shower all your plants together

Giving all your plants one quick shower simultaneously will save you lots of time. I've also found that doing this and closing the shower door with all the plants inside helps promote growth as the humidity increases in the shower.

Use the beer bottle trick

Myth #3: You Don't Have a Green Thumb

This myth of needing a "Green Thumb" is completely false. Just like any other skill, planting is something everyone is capable of learning. By now you should know that it doesn't take much to keep plants alive. Just like you and me, plants are pretty resilient. Even if your plant starts to wilt or brown, this doesn't mean your plant is dead, it can still recover from a week or two (maybe even three weeks...okay a month) of negligence.

But if you have a track record of killing plants, you might want to try these five plants that thrive off of you forgetting about them.

Plants that thrive off of neglect

Yes you read that correctly, there are plants that thrive off of you forgetting to water them for a month! As humans, it can sometimes be hard to take care of ourselves let alone another living organism. Multiple different life stressors can get in the way of us adequately taking care of ourselves and our plants and that's ok! If you resonate with this, you might want to consider adopting plants that actually thrive off your negligence, that way you can still reap the mental and physical benefits of owning houseplants.

Some houseplants that thrive off of you forgetting about them are:

Killing plants is part of the process.

Whatever you do, DO NOT be discouraged if you kill a plant or two (or 6) during your plant parent journey. According to a survey conducted by the Consumer Goods & FMCG, results show that 37% of non-expert gardeners in the U.S. kill at least 1-2 plants a year. 24.8% of Americans kill 3-5 plants a year and 11.5% kill 6 or more plants a year so moral of the story is, you're not alone.

Reminder: You may think you don't have a green thumb because you haven't researched the type of care your plant needs. Many plants look similar but require different attention, make sure you do your own research before you buy a plant!