How to Grow a Peacock Plant in Just Water?

Calathea makoyana, also known as the Peacock plant, is a striking tropical houseplant that can liven up any interior. It is renowned for its stunning, contrasting green and purplish-red foliage. But, they do require some effort to keep in good shape.

Like many other indoor plants, the peacock plant is native to the tropics, which is one of the reasons it thrives there, and in similar environments. It grows beneath the shade eaves of large, tropical trees in Brazil’s natural tropical woods. The Calathea’s appealing foliage makes them so well-liked among homeowners as indoor plants. These large, lean plants will fill your collection of indoor plants with lovely color without taking up much room. If you’re wondering, here’s how to grow a Peacock plant with just water.

Table of Contents

Growing a Peacock Plant

Peacock plants may be grown outside in some growth zones, but because of their tropical origins, they are normally cultivated indoors, where the climate is consistently warm all year. The temperatures in USDA Hardiness Zones 10A to 11 are warm enough for outdoor plant growth in the shade of other trees or bushes. The Peacock plant, like any other plant, is going to need water to grow. Luckily, this will be your guide on how to grow a Peacock plant in just water.

Watering the Peacock Plant

Maintaining the proper humidity and watering schedules for Peacock plants is crucial. The key to watering is maintaining a good moisture level in the soil while preventing it from becoming waterlogged. Once the top of the earth begins to feel a little dry, water your Peacock plant. You may bring the plant to the sink and give it a good watering until the drainage holes are clear.

After a few minutes, allow it to drain completely from the sink, leaving the soil beautifully wet but not soggy. Before watering your plant again in the winter, let the top half inch of the container’s potting soil dry up when plant development slows.

Brown leaves signal the plant needs more water, while yellow leaves signify overwatering. Rainwater collection or distilled water at room temperature. Municipal water containing fluoride can harm plants. If you decide to use purified water instead of tap water to water your plants, let the water sit for a few days to allow the chlorine in the water break down.

Knowing when to water indoor plants is one of the most challenging aspects of plant maintenance, and the Peacock plant is no exception. While working so hard to cherish and care for them, it’s too simple to water them excessively or insufficiently. One of the most crucial things you can learn to keep your houseplants flourishing is how to correctly determine when a houseplant needs water.

Know When to Water the Peacock Plant

Use several strategies to ensure that you are watering your Peacock plants at the appropriate time. A Peacock plant, for instance, requires watering if the soil is dry and the leaves are withering. Overwatering is the most frequent cause of root rot in a plant with withering leaves and extremely damp soil.

A peacock plant exhibits signs due to various issues, which is why you will need to learn more about your Peacock plant. Consider the plant’s overall state rather than focusing on a single indication that it needs water. Educating yourself on the outcome of how much water Peacock plants require in addition to knowing when they want water is critical.

Using a Moisture Meter

Some indoor plant enthusiasts only need to check the moisture in the soil using a popsicle stick or chopstick. But those who seek a more precise and objective outcome from their moisture test prefer to spend money on soil moisture meters.

A soil moisture meter is a very helpful tool. It undoubtedly removes the element of the guesswork from attempting to time when to water your indoor plants. Typically, moisture meters have a scale from 1 to 10. Typically, 1 means extremely dry, and 10 means extremely wet. Most also contain color meters, which may be used to decide when it’s best to water indoor plants and when to wait.

Pot Weight

You can decide when to water your houseplants more effectively in the long run by becoming familiar with the weight of your plants. It will feel heavier than a container with dry soil when a home plant has damp soil.

When the house plant’s water has gone, the weight of the pot will have significantly changed. This might help you determine when the house plant needs water in general. The closer it gets to requiring additional water, the lighter the pot becomes.

Dry Leaves

Your Peacock plant may start to dry out if you do not water it appropriately or frequently enough, resulting in leaves falling off. To evaluate whether this is uncommon for your plant, you will need to look at the pattern and amount of leaf drops. Many healthy plants may lose some older/mature leaves to replenish their foliage.

Excessive leaf drops can occur when a plant doesn’t get enough water, and young and adult leaves will begin to dry out and fall off. In fact, a plant that has been submerged is more likely to have young leaves that wilt and drop, so watch for this trend.

Check the Soil Manually

It is crucial to check the soil’s moisture content deep inside the pot because the soil’s surface look might be misleading. The soil under the surface may seem humid, but it may be completely dry farther down where the roots are. This occasionally occurs when individuals sip water from their plants. Here, a modest amount of water is applied to the soil’s surface rather than saturating it.

Most often, the surface will appear dry even when the underlying soil is still extremely moist and the plant does not yet require watering. To check the soil’s moisture content, use a stick or skewer. Choose a stick that hasn’t been treated or discolored because you should.

Choose a chopstick or a popsicle stick if you want to utilize an untreated, unstained stick. The stick should be inserted into the ground at least a few inches deep, carefully keeping the roots out of the way. The plant will determine how deeply you place the stick. Make sure to insert the stick halfway into the soil if your plant needs watering after the top half of the soil has dried out.

You don’t need expensive machinery or sophisticated tools to determine whether or not your Peacock plant needs water. A simple touch test may be sufficient to stay on top of watering needs. Every few days, insert your finger into the soil to check the moisture content and determine if the soil is dry.

Typically, the earth dries from the surface downward. Some plants may require watering as soon as the top inch of soil dries. Others may only require watering when the soil is entirely dry down to where you can feel it.

Pruning and Repotting

Your Calathea doesn’t require as much trimming as other houseplants do. The leaves occasionally become yellow or brown with aging and eventually perish. With a pair of clean, sharp scissors, remove any dead leaves by cutting them at the soil line or where they connect to the main stem.

Every one to two years, you should repot your peacock plant into a slightly bigger container; ideally, you should do this in the spring or early summer. Plants can recover more quickly from the shock of repotting in the spring because they start actively growing after the chilly winter months. To “refresh” the nutritional level and organic matter while repotting, add fresh potting soil or combine completed compost into the mixture. If they are root-bound, make sure to untangle the roots. Also, avoid adding a “drainage layer” to the bottom of pots when adding growth soil. For a long time, novice gardeners were instructed to follow this highly recommended method.

Ending Note

To take full advantage of the heat and humidity of the summer growing season, the optimum time to plant or repot peacock plants is in the early spring. Because they cannot handle direct sunshine, keep them in an area with indirect light.

Calathea peacocks should be grown indoors if you live somewhere with cold winters since they won’t withstand the frost. Warm-weather evergreen perennials called peacock plants require humidity to flourish. Peacock plants have a maximum height of four feet when fully grown.

Instead of growing vertically, they have a clumping growth pattern and spread extensively. Repotting is necessary for healthy plants if you want them to reach their maximum potential. By maintaining them in tiny pots, you can manage their size.