After bringing your new, wonderfully lush, and vibrant green plant home from the nursery, make sure to take the proper precautions to keep it lush, healthy, and growing. Just as we do, plants also need air, water, and food. Plants get their food from light and making sure they get enough light is just as important as making sure your plant gets watered properly. Evansville’s top florist shop, Zeidler’s Flowers,‘ is here to help you recognize signs of distress in your plant and ways to ensure it’s receiving enough light to thrive.

How Your Plant Shows You It Needs More Light

Leggy

A “leggy” plant is one with tall and thin stems with a scarce amount of leaves and indicates the plant is not receiving enough light. The skinny stems also have wide spaces between adjacent leaves which contributes to the leggy and scarce look.

Smaller Leaves

In an effort to conserve energy, a plant will produce smaller leaves. Compare new growth to old growth to see if there is a marked difference in leaf size, and, if so, relocate the plant to a sunnier area.

Leaning

A leaning plant is a symptom of your plant doing what it has to for survival, which is moving all of its leaves and stems to the one source of lighting its receiving. To prevent this, make sure your plant is getting plenty of light and give it a quarter turn at least once a week to ensure all of the leaves are being adequately fed.

Abnormal Leaf Color

If your plant shows signs of pale, yellowing leaves or leaves dropping off, then it’s likely it needs more light. When a plant doesn’t get enough light, then the chlorophyll that makes the photosynthesis process happen cannot do its job, resulting in pale, dull leaves. Also, with variegated plant leaves, if they’ve lost their coloring and reverted to just green, then that is another sign of insufficient sunlight.

Slowed Growth

When a plant isn’t getting enough sunlight, it will conserve energy by slowing down its growth, or if it’s really light-starved, shutting down new growth altogether. During the winter months it’s natural for plant growth to slow down, but if you’re not seeing any noticeable growth during the spring and summer, then try to get more light to your plant.

Getting the Light Right

Depending on the species of plant, it’s size, and the amount of sunlight coming into your home will factor into trying to figure out how much light a plant needs. It may take some trial and error but noticing any of the above signs will help you take action.

There is such a thing as too much light for plant, though, so only place sun-loving plants like palms, succulents, and cacti in full direct light for most of the day.

Otherwise, moving the plants around to different widows, elevating them, or getting a grow light will keep your plant babies happy and healthy.