hi it's Nell and welcome to my patio on
this lovely day I am surrounded by
plants I love because I want to tell you
how to take care of
Saras AKA snake
plants sometimes called mother-in-law
tongue bow string hemp um I consider
them to be DieHard house plants so I'm
going to tell you how to care for
[Music]
them there are two ways that you can
kill these in my opinion which I will
touch on in this video but I'm going to
summarize it at the end so stick around
um until the end but they are pretty
much
indestructible um even if you don't have
a green thumb
these will definitely turn your thumb
green now not everybody loves these
plants because they are a little bit
what I call architectural bold sassy
they make a statement they're not soft
touchy feely
plants but I happen to love the look of
Sansa varas so for
me I have quite a few of them indoors
now
and a few of mine actually grow outdoors
in the shade in Santa Barbara I grew
them outdoors in my garden a lot I lived
about seven blocks away from the
ocean and they did fine there I didn't
have any in my home because I went
through this phase for like many many
many years where I didn't want any house
plants and now I'm like really into
house plants again so I have quite a few
of them these are only you not a couple
of the Sans of areas I have or for them
but um I really love them and for me
it's a plant that I will probably get
more of because here in the desert where
I live now they're a very easy plant to
take care of because they can handle the
dry
air and they can go dry now they come in
many different um forms I guess you
would call it there's flat leaf there's
um cylindrical round Leaf the there's
more of the concave Leaf there's ones
that are
dwarf or the bird's nest variety uh
there's ones that get tall like the
rasat here gets about 4 feet tall the
laurenti gets almost that tall too and
they will just spread and spread so they
come in a variety of colors also so you
can get a silverish you can get yellow
you can get chartreuse you can get dark
green you can get a white one too and
everything in in between those oh and
they also come with wavy edges that
there's a variety or two that have that
and there's also um the cylindrical ones
the round ones they are braid so you can
get those in these wild and crazy crazy
shapes and these are evergreen
perennials but what you should know
about these is they are very long lived
unlike some house plants that don't have
nearly as long a lifespan these you will
have for a long time on to watering
because even though this is a very easy
plant to maintain it does need water but
I have three words for you on it easy
does it these are subject to root
rot because they um spread by a romes
and The Roots come off of those and both
the roots and the ryome store a lot a
lot of water so you want to make sure
not to over overwater them so I water
mine here in Tucson every two weeks in
the summer is all in the winter when
it's um the light is not as strong um
and I don't keep my house quite as hot
because I don't I don't have the air
conditioning on now I will eventually
put it on but I keep my house about 80 I
I I don't like it really cold and in the
winter it can be a bit cooler so I
usually water them about every three or
four weeks in the winter so for you it
could be anywhere from every two weeks
to every six or eight weeks depending on
how much light you have and the
temperature of your house and the size
of the pot because something in a
smaller pot is going to need to be
watered more off often than something in
a larger pot it is usually so quiet
around here all I can really
hear are the birds you know I don't know
if you can hear them now but that car
alarm was just going off so it's gone
off now but I kind of cut that short but
what I wanted to say is what you want to
do is you want to water thoroughly and
you want to let the uh water drain out
of the pot you don't want it to sit in
water at all and then you want it to dry
out before you water it again
so if you travel a lot or you tend to
ignore your
plants this is the one for you
temperature now because I'm talking
about this as a house plant I'm not
going to get into the hardiness zones at
all because if your house is comfortable
for you it'll be fine for these plants
mine seem to love my warmer house but in
the cool you know the cool temperatures
they just aren't going to grow as much
but what I do want to say is uh they can
take a wide variety of of temperatures
cuz these um I've got like five or six
of these and they spent the winter
Outdoors so in small pots they were fine
you know we got cool so they can take
that these were living
indoors um I'm about to do a project
where I'm going to plant these in the
same pot with those which I think will
be striking of course I'll do it for you
because I'm going to I mean I'll film it
for you because I'm going to be
transplanting this one and then I have
another one I want to transplant so it's
sort of the the uh the snake plant
Switcheroo but um if you have yours
outside for the summer you just want to
make sure you get it in before it gets
too cold because they cannot take
temperatures too much below 32 or
definitely not snow so if they summer
Outdoors be sure to bring them in for
the winter I often times don't touch on
air circulation with house plants unless
it's something like airplants you know
they really like air circulation but I
am going to touch on air circulation
with these because if your air is very
still or very stale no problem with
these they can handle it just fine
conversely they can also they're also
suited to be in a bathroom or something
that's you know a lot more humid than it
is where I was in Santa Barbara it's
obviously more humid than here being so
close to the ocean and here I'm very
very dry the plants are doing fabulous
so onto soil or the mix that they are
planted in the things that are very
important is that it has to be well
drained and it has to drain fast to
because remember they are subject to
root rots so you don't want them to rot
out so I because I like to combine
things I do potting soil with succulent
mix about half and half and then I also
top it with worm compost and compost and
I will also mix some compost in too now
you can either do Straight succulent and
Cactus mix or you can do straight
potting soil but if you use potting soil
just be sure to ease up on the water
even more so because potting soil holds
water more than does a succulent and
Cactus mix so in terms of transplanting
the good news is is you don't have to
rush to transplant a snake plant at all
they actually do much better when being
pot bound I found that once every two to
5 years it's just fine if yours is
growing in really low light every every
5 to 10 years might be just fine let
show you this little Futura Superba up
close I don't know if you can tell but
the pot's actually
oval and the roots are probably going to
break this pot soon but the plant's
doing just fine and it's not going to
bother it at all and the best time to
transplant your snake plant which is a
house plant is either spring or summer
the winter The Roots like to rest so it
is not the best time to transplant now
in regards to fertilizer I don't think
I've ever fertilized
Saras but I do compost Every Spring so I
usually do a combo of worm compost and
compost and I just top off my house
plants with that too that's all I use
but you could use a balanced liquid
organic fertilizer would be just fine
for it and you would want to do it once
in the spring would probably do it if
you feel it needs more do it in the
summer too but don't fertilize in the
fall into winter because as I just said
the plant is going to be resting at that
time but they are very very um I would
call them independent and not very needy
of feeding as I said they sort of thrive
on neglect huh but of course I do talk
to mine so I don't totally don't totally
neglect them and pests of course we have
to talk about pests because plants and
pests go hand in hand uh the only things
that I've seen them with um are spiderm
and Mee bugs and I saw those on uh
commercial accounts because I used to be
an interior plants scaper so mine hav't
never had any but I have done posts on
both uh spider mites and melee bugs Post
in video so I will leave the links for
you in the blog post and also Below in
case yours gets any any kind of pest but
they're pretty
resilient another plus now propagation
I'm not going to touch on that too much
here because I've already done a video
and a blog post on that so the video
link will be down below the blog post
link will be in the blog
post but how I usually propagate them is
by
division now this one I could easily
divide this moonshine I could easily
divide it into three
plants and the fura Superba I could
divide into four or
five and the other way that's fairly
easy is by leaf cuting and usually
usually cut the leaf up but this um Leaf
back
here fell out of a
pot and I just wanted to see if the
whole Leaf would propagate successfully
and it does so I've done a video and a
post on that which I will hopefully get
up soon
cuz it's already
rooted my fancy steup job there huh and
the other way to propagate is by seed
but that is more time consuming just
want to tell you that snake plants do
flow but but they're not sold for that
it's not a very common occurrence as a
house plant you might have it for years
and years and years and you see a flower
it flowers one year and then it doesn't
flower again it's not a regular thing
but they're uh either whitish or
greenish and they're very sweet smelling
I have a picture of a sanaria flower in
the blog post and I have um I had this
variety here the trifasciata in my Santa
Barbara Garden would um flower like
every other
year and it's very very sweet smelling
now the last thing I'm going to touch on
is safe for pets and I will start it by
saying that I've got two cats and my
cats don't pay any any attention all to
these plants leaves are pretty tough but
I am not I have not done a lot of tests
I haven't done any tests on um plants
being toxic to cats or dogs I just get
my information from reliable
sources and some of most say that they
are slightly toxic there are a few that
say they can kill an animal I don't know
um most things just say they will make
them slightly
nauseous vomiting and diara so I will
just I will just give you that
information and you can process it
however you want to okay so I think I
have gone
over everything that I wanted to touch
on for for this house plant snake plant
Extravaganza there will be more details
in the blog post as always the link will
be down below or you can go to our
website joyous garden.com this plant is
also in our house plant book which is
keep your house plants live so if you're
interested in house plants or you want
to know how to maintain um the ones that
are tried and true get the book um it'll
also help you to make some choices if
you are looking for some gorgeous
Foliage for your home okay so the two
things that I feel that can really
destroy this plant are too much water
and too much hot direct sun now most
people don't have like the hot sun
direct sun issue in their
homes I found that more you I know
people have the Lower Lights so that's
easy but the um the
overwatering just be really really
careful when you water this plant not to
kill it with kindness and if you just
remember those two things this plant
will be fine so I hope you have found
this video
about growing Saria AK snake plants as
house plants to be helpful I find them
easy easy as can be I I've also grown
them outdoors and I've done a post about
that so I will leave the link down below
I think there's a video that goes along
with that too so that'll be down below
and also in the blog post but I thank
you for all your likes and your
subscribes I really appreciate them I
have a lot more videos coming your way
quite a few things on house plants
sprinkled in with some garden stuff too
of course and uh let's get out in the
garden speaking of garden and make our
our Gardens a more beautiful place
whether they are outdoor Gardens or they
are indoor gardens as always I thank you
so much for watching bye