Air today, gone tomorrow! How to care for your air-plants

I have been asked if you can kill an air-plant and the short answer is yes and yes I have lost one myself. So to avoid losing one, here are some simple tips:

1. WATER & FEED:

a. Get a misting spray like this cheap one for a £1 and use only rainwater from your water butt.

b. Even better, buy a pre-mixed air-plant water-feed spray like this one:

c. Spray the air-plants twice to three times a week.

d. The sharp-eyed among you will have notice I fitted clear polystyrene backsplashes to the shelves (using Styrene Clear Polystyrene Flat Glazing sheet, (L)1.2m (W)0.6m (T)2mm £22 B&Q cut to size). This means the spray mist will not damage my wall.

2. LIGHT

a. My display faces a east facing window and in the summer, sunlight streams in the morning and hits the display for a few hours. The rest of the time , it has indirect light.

b. However, in the winter, there is simply not enough light to sustain these plants, and so I have added a grow light as below which can be set on a timer to come on between 3 - 12 hours - 3hrs is sufficient to keep them happy but as they are part of the larger display with cacti and succulents, 6hrs light is better.

And that is about it in terms of care.

Every so often, you may have to remove dead or dry leaves to keep them looking good.

And if you see new shoots (pups) coming up next to the mother plant (or buy them with the pups already), these can be carefully teased off without damaging the mother air-plant and you will end up with lots you could even sell one day.

So this is a short care blog to keep things easy and simple for you.

Till next time when we will tackle succulents and cacti, I leave you with this cartoon:

Adios amigos,

Miles 👦🏻💜🌵