Keep your plants alive over Christmas

It’s nearly that most wonderful time of the year again when you merrily leave home to spend an intense period of time with your family to watch nostalgic movies, wear novelty jumpers and stuff your face with Turkey. You get through Christmas unscathed and you think what a jolly, jolly time of year. Then you return home, walk through the front door and find that some of your plants have withered. And some of them, unfortunately, are dead. Whoops! You forgot to water them!

Thankfully, we have a simple hack to keep your plants happy while you’re away.

1. Fill a jug or saucepan with water.

2. Take some cotton string. Place one end inside the jug, making sure it reaches the bottom of the container. If the string keeps rising to the surface, tie a small weight to it to keep it down.

3. Between the plant and the edge of its pot, make a small hole around 2 or 3 inches deep. Take care not to disturb the plant’s roots.

4. Feed the other end of the string into the hole you’ve made, and gently compact the soil around it to keep it in place.

5. As the soil dries out, water will travel up the string to replenish the moisture, so long as the string remains straight.

Just a note: only use this hack for plants that need daily watering. Your succulents would rather you just let them be while you’re away from home, so long as it’s for no longer than a week or so.

And that’s it! So simple! Happy holidays to you and your plant babies.