With the cold season knocking on the door, it’s time to take extra care of your plants
Plants are raised like kids. They are also vulnerable to external changes. A gardener is like, in most of the cases, a single parent. Like a good mother, he or she can feel the change in the weather even if it is a small nip that can only be felt on the tip of the nose. And the nip in the air says winter is round the corner. Without any delay, start making arrangements to save your ‘kids’.
Most of the plants that we grow here as indoor ornamental ones come from places like West Bengal, Andhra, Karnataka or Kerala. The climatic conditions of all these places do not match those of the North Indian plains, where the winter and summer are two extremes. Nature has its own mechanisms, but up to a limit these plants can put up a fight. Here comes the role of a gardener.
Nature has given many a plant species a mechanism to shed leaves in adverse weather and go dormant. The new growth process is suspended, so there is no question of any injury.
I once got a query from a gardener who said he had made the plant healthy by feeding it well during summer and now the well-fed leaves were getting lost with the onset of winter. I explained to him that there was no cause of concern as nature had already handled that! Before shedding leaves, the plants withdraw most of the nutrients from the leaves and store it. Even the shed leaves, with little nutrients, decompose and further add nutrient to soil and recycle continues. The plants that shed leaves during fall are mussaenda, ixoras; deciduous fruit plants like peach, plum, pear, grapes etc. The most vulnerable shade-loving indoor plants, or even outdoor ones, to cold include dieffenbachia, aglaonemas, marantas, calatheas, crotons and tulsi.
As I explained earlier, the background from where these plants come, they like to be together. So plants in a group are safer. Those in soil, in a bed, are already safe and we have seen some good grown crotons sail through the winter with almost negligible injury. Do not keep vulnerable potted plants at a place where they face the cold wind. Prefer a place where these are under a porch. Even an hour or two of rising sun will make them happy. At times when you have just planted chicku, mango or litchi, these have to be saved. You can make a thatch cover around the plant, tying it near the head. Keep the South-East end open, so that they enjoy the sun. If your plants are exposed, you can cover them with net or poly cloth that can be removed in the morning.
Did you ever think why the elders tied a red cloth around a tulsi plant? Traditional Hindu families arrange ‘tulsi wedding’ nowadays and tie a red drape or cloth on it. This, in fact, is providing safety to the plant in the changing weather! These will also be shifted under shelter. Left exposed to winter, tulsi sheds leaves and dies. What will you call it? Experience? Start believing elders, they have been around for many more years!
(The author is a retired horticulturist from Punjab Agriculture University based in Chandigarh)
