Winter watering schedule, with the meter readings
By early December the days are short, the apartment is at 66 degrees Fahrenheit with the heating on a timer, and every plant drinks less. Last winter I overwatered three plants into root rot by keeping the summer schedule. This year I am letting the moisture meter decide, and writing down what it says, so that next year I have a baseline instead of a guess.
The meter is a cheap two-prong type that reads from 1 to 10. I push it to about two thirds of the pot depth, read it, then pull it out and wipe it. Readings this first week of December, seven days after each plant was last watered:
- Monstera, 12-inch pot, east window: 4. Still moist. Not watering.
- Pothos, three hanging pots, east window: 2, 3, 2. Watered the two at 2.
- Snake plant, north window: 5. Will probably not need water until January.
- Fiddle-leaf fig, east window: 3. Watering next weekend.
- Fern, north window on a tray of pebbles: 3, but ferns want 4 or more, so watered.
- Succulents on the brightest sill: 1 across the board. Watered lightly, once, for the month.
Compared with my summer notes, the gap between waterings has roughly doubled for everything except the fern. The monstera went from every 5 days to about every 11. The pothos from 4 to 9. The snake plant from 2 weeks to what looks like 5 or 6. The succulents, which I used to water fortnightly in July, are on a monthly splash and look better for it, tight and firm rather than stretched.
Two other things I have changed: I water in the morning so the pots have the warmer daytime hours to dry a little, and I have moved the fern to a tray of wet pebbles because the heated air was browning its tips within days. The humidity gauge on the shelf reads 32 percent most mornings, which is desert conditions as far as a fern is concerned.
I will take readings every Sunday through February and summarize them in March. The goal is simple: no soft, yellow, rotting stems this winter, and a chart I can trust next year.