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Key Points
- Some houseplants, like African violets, can suffer from weather damage or drying out when moved outdoors.
- Moving plants like ficus outdoors can cause stress and leaf loss due to sudden environmental changes.
- Keeping plants indoors ensures they stay in stable conditions, avoiding harm from heat, rain, or poor drainage.
Moving your plants outdoors in the summer can seem like a great idea, but not every plant is meant to thrive in this seasonal change. In fact, moving some plants outside during the summer can do more harm than good.
Before you start moving your plants, we checked in with a horticulturist to learn which plants should be kept inside. Here are the top five houseplants they urge you to keep indoors this summer.
Meet the Expert
Justin Hancock is a horticulturist at Costa Farms.
African Violet
The African violet (Saintpaulia ionantha) is a stunning houseplant you may want to relocate to the porch this summer, but it’s one that plant expert Justin Hancock urges you to keep inside.
“Cute and charming African violets are relatively small houseplants that can easily get lost or damaged outside if there are strong winds, heavy rain, etc.,” he says. “The fuzzy leaves don’t like to stay wet for extended periods, so if you’re in a rainy area it can be a challenge.”
If you live in a region where the summers can be quite dry and scorching, this also doesn’t mesh well with this plant’s needs.
“In warmer, brighter conditions, they’ll use water faster, so it’s more of a chore to keep up them outdoors than in. I prefer to keep them inside on a windowsill or bright table top all year long,” Hancock says.
Ficus Varieties With Thin Leaves
Another common houseplant that adds earthy texture and hues is anything in the ficus family. These houseplants can fit right in with your decor, and just like your home decor they need to stay inside so they can stay in a consistent environment.
“A big change in environment, such as going from indoors to out, is a pretty big stressor,” Hancock says. “You can reduce the stress and leaf drop somewhat by acclimating the plant to outdoor conditions, and then re-acclimating it back to indoor conditions come fall, but you should still expect a fair amount of leaves to fall.”
Cyclamen
Even though cyclamens (Cyclamen persicum) are more often treated as a short-term gift plant than a houseplant, if yours are still thriving you should know that cyclamen doesn’t like the hot temperatures that come with the summer season.
“If your Cyclamen still happens to be growing happy and healthy, leave it be. Keep it in a cool, bright spot and water as the top 25% or so of the potting mix starts to dry to the touch,” Hancock says. “If it’s going dormant or already dormant, reduce watering and keep it in a cool spot. Resume regular watering a couple of months.”
Extra-Large Houseplants
Extra-large houseplants can be great for adding dramatic appeal to your home’s exterior, but they may not love their new placement. Some houseplants are known to hit a growth spurt when you place them outside in the summer, and this isn’t something you need to do if you have plants that are already pretty large.
“You’ll have to worry about whether they’ll outgrow their space by the time you need to bring them back inside,” Hancock says.
This is especially true, he adds, of houseplants like birds of paradise that don’t take well to pruning.
Plants in Pots Without Drainage
If you have some plants or flowers in a pot without good drainage, putting them outside can be a disaster waiting to happen.
According to Hancock, drainage acts as an “insurance policy” for your plants to make sure excess moisture is able to leave properly before the water drowns your plants or leads to root rot. If you place a plant outside that doesn’t have adequate drainage, you might be in for a buildup of water.
“Outdoors, especially if your plants are located in a spot where they may be subjected to heavy rain or you have variable weather patterns that make their water use unpredictable, drainage becomes a lot more important,” Hancock says.
Read the original article on The Spruce
