Cyclamen

Cyclamen should be kept in cool temperatures. Too much heat can cause the leaves to yellow and the plant to stop blooming.

Provide your cyclamen with as much light as possible to encourage blooming. Sunburn usually isn't a problem in winter.

Keep the plant well watered. With good care, it should continue to bloom for another month or two.

Poinsettias

Keep poinsettias away from warm or cold drafts. Keep the soil moist, but not wet. Poinsettias need well-drained soil, so if your plant was wrapped in foil, tear the foil off the bottom so it can drain.

Like cyclamen, poinsettias prefer cooler temperatures, not above 70 degrees. If possible, move your poinsettia to a cooler area at night.

Give it plenty of sun and fertilize it about once a month.

Any active houseplants will also benefit from being fertilized once or twice this winter. But don't feed the ones that are dormant. Let them get some sleep so they'll be rested and ready in the spring!

Keeping your houseplants healthy during winter months may seem difficult. Light from windows is reduced, days are shorter and humidity may be lower due to heating. But by making a few changes, you can help keep your houseplants healthy.

Keeping things light

In winter, your plants receive sunlight for less time and in less intensity. Houseplants native to rainforests that are used to lower light will be fine with that, but most plants need more light. Try to move your plants near a brighter window (S/SW exposure) to get them more sunlight.

If you have no brighter windows (due to shade trees or apartment living), you might want to consider the purchase of plant lamps that are designed to provide the full spectrum light your plants need. They can be mounted under shelves over plants or on specially-designed plant stands. Leave them on about eight hours a day, and they'll give your plants the light they need.

You can also use cool fluorescent bulbs as close as 6 inches from the top of plants.

Temperature

Most plants do not do well when subjected to rapid fluctuations in temperature. Keep them away from hot air sources and cold drafts alike. Run ceiling fans on low if the house is closed up. Fans break up stagnant air; that's healthier for both you and your plants.

Humidity

Some symptoms of low humidity are brown leaf tips and wilting. Low humidity makes your plants work harder to get moisture from the air and soil, as well as keep what they have inside.

One way to give your plants some extra humidity is to mist them two or three times a day. The water will evaporate off the leaves and provide a cloud of higher humidity around the plant. For a less labor-intensive method, put a layer of pebbles in the bottom of a tray and fill the tray with just enough water to cover the bottom of the tray (below the top of the pebbles). Place potted plants in the tray.

Other

Fertilizing should be done less often for most plants in winter.

Give your plants a good washing. Dirt, dust, grease, and other particles can settle on leaves. Dirty leaves can't absorb as much sunlight as clean ones. Gently wipe clean the leaves with a soft sponge or cloth dipped in plain water. Sturdier plants can even be given a quick shower in the bathroom with tepid water.

Nancy Westler
Green Thumb Garden Professional

Peach Leaf Curl

For all the backyard peach and nectarine growers..now is the time to spray for control of peach leaf curl.

Peach leaf curl (PLC), formally known as Taphrina deformans, is a fungal disease that causes leaves to pucker, distort and curl in odd ways. Cool wet weather that occurs in the spring, especially during flower bud break and leaf emergence, is ideal for the over-wintering spores of PLC to germinate.

Think to last spring - 2006 'treated' us to periods of rain and cooler-than-normal temperatures. When PLC is severe, affected leaves (and in some cases, fruit) will drop earlier in the season.

So what can be done? Spray in the winter after the leaves have dropped or in the spring before bud break. Now is the time to be preventing PLC. Lilly Miller Dormant Spray for Disease is the product to use to stop the spread of the disease. It can be used now, but once the leaf is damaged the disfiguration is permanent.