Meet Dorcas the Ficus, my only houseplant.
This is a picture I took of her a couple of days ago, with most of her leaves.
This is a picture I took of her a couple of days ago, with most of her leaves.
I had a hunch that something was up, she just hasn't been her perky self lately. I wanted to believe that it was just a 24-hour flu or something. But then I kept finding leaves on the floor next to her, so I knew I was wrong.
Perhaps male-pattern baldness, I thought.
Wrong again. And worse than I thought.
The technical term for her condition is oligohypohydration, or in laymen's terms, infrequent underwatering.
With this particular condition, plants go days, sometimes over a week with unquenched thirst. Often, when they do get watered they are inundated with water and extra plant food, as if it somehow might make up for the lack of proper care.
What a terrible way to die.
Needless to say, I feel awful. I can't believe it happened...again.
When I first graduated from BYU, I had a townhouse in Draper, Utah since I was working in Salt Lake City (at this time I was also engaged to a Mr. Tom Draper - how fitting). As a housewarming gift, my little sister bought me a ficus plant (it wasn't really around long enough to get a name). I'll cut to the chase - it died. Same cause of death too. Ironically, I'm a nurse...and nurses kind of are into promoting life, if you know what I mean (and I think you do). Luckily, I do better with real living things. Well, plants are real living things, but you know what I'm getting at. I mean, like, the kind of living things that can sue me.
Poor, defenseless plant(s).
Before I take all the blame on myself, though, please consider what I noticed this morning when I greeted Dorcas:
Does that not look like a bite out of one of her leaves?
For Braden's sake, I hope ficus plants are nontoxic.
For Braden's sake, I hope ficus plants are nontoxic.
I'd call Poison Control but I might have called them a few weeks ago to find out if a few bites of deodorant is hazardous to a 2 year old. As long as oligohypohydration isn't contagious, I think he'll be fine.
3 comments:
Hilarious! I too share the black thumb of death and have resigned myself to silk plants...Oh and the things I have learned from the poison control center...drinking a whole bottle of children's ibprophen is OK as long as it is in one dose. Also the rinse aid you put in the dishwasher is not toxic either.
Hey neither is an entire bottle of Amoxycillin (sp?). Yeah don't ask how I know that. It won't kill a toddler but it does make them pretty sick to their stomach - icky. Not recommended. On the plant note, my husband got me an orchid for mother's day (he apparently still doesn't know me very well after 6 years of marriage)...It died...kinda. It has been cut down to the base which consists of a stubby stem and 2 leaves. I think I heard Rob get super excited because it looks to be growing again. No thanks to me. I haven't even looked at the thing in months.
We had a similar experience recently with a cucumber plant. Very sad.
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