How Not to Kill Your Houseplants: A Beginner’s Guide with 3 Plants

The goal of this post is to help you not kill your mother’s beloved snake plant she gave you a clipping of for your 24th birthday.

I’m going to show you how not to kill your houseplants with 3 very easy-to-care-for houseplants.

You’re probably wondering by now what a snake plant exactly is. Its super-cool scientific name is Dracaena trifasciata, also known as mother-in-law’s tongue (yikes). I picked it as your first “easy” plant because I actually (unintentionally) attempted to kill mine this Winter 2021 just to see how long it would take for it to just give up and die.

It didn’t.

It also survived the infamous Texas ice storm and my cat’s incessant digging-up of its roots.

They are the most resilient things I have ever seen in my life, hence why they often sit inside family-owned Tex-Mex restaurants lined up at the corners of the aisles for kids to prick their fingers into the fleshy parts of the plant (because it’s fun).

They look like this:

A snake plant is what we can categorize underneath “Top 3 Easiest Plants to Care For” as it requires low light and low water.

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So, ideally, you would want an unstoppable, unkillable houseplant to have these 3 characteristics:

• Low sunlight needs (if you intend on keeping this plant inside*)
• Low water intake
• Forgiveness

When I say forgiveness, I mean that there are some plants out there where if you overwater them, they will just straight up die (from root rot). Yes, I am slightly exaggerating, but this is particularly the case with succulents. So, try to find a plant that won’t be overdramatic. We will get to that in the next section.

* Do NOT just stick whatever poor plant you get into a room without any sunlight as it WILL die. You can rotate it to a balcony or a room with high sunlight for several hours every few days, but keeping a plant completely isolated will kill it.

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The 3 Easiest Houseplants to Care For

Is this what you’ve been waiting for? Did you CTRL+F to get here? Well, here it is:

1. Snake Plant
2. Pothos
3. Brasil

Just don’t let your pets eat these plants because it can make them very sick. Otherwise, go crazy with decorating.

site creator, 2022

How to Care for Snake Plants, Pothos, and Brasil

Okay, hear me out, I know that the different types of names of plants sound kinda silly, but I find that over time, it feels a bit endearing. I am sure that this is likely how other hobbyists feel about their craft explaining it to others.

Here is a cheat sheet for quick, easy plant care:

Now, here is the long version:

1. Snake Plant:
   • Native to tropical West Africa from Nigeria east to the Congo
   • Does best in indirect sunlight such as directly in front of a north-facing window, however, can survive in some direct sunlight
   • Prefers a loose, well-drained potting mix such as cactus potting soil
   • Prefers warm conditions and suffers >50 degrees

2. Pothos:

• These plants are native to French Polynesia, and can eventually become trees. There are said to be around 15 types of Pothos, and they come in colors of neon green, shades of white, or shades of gold.
  • Prefers a well-draining potting mix with ingredients such as perlite for air
  • Prefers temperatures <65F and can have cellular rupture >40F

3. Brasil:

• AKA heartleaf philodendrons, these plants hail from Central America and the Caribbean. An image of the plant is located above the start of the “plant care” section.
  • Prefers well-draining, acidic soil containing potting soil, perlite, or peat moss
  • Prefers indirect sunlight more than pothos as the foliage will burn in direct sunlight and create more variegation

In short, whatever you take away from this post is that you should at the very least pay attention to the way they look every so often.

Snap a picture the first time you get your plant and then compare it to today. See if there’s anything different. Plants also tend to come with a little sticker or some type of label where you can identify them.

Good luck, friends.