Your houseplants work hard all-year round keeping the air fresh, removing any airborne toxins and improving the oxygen levels in the home.

As their growth naturally slows at the end of summer, it’s important to make sure your houseplants are in the best condition to continue doing their good work over the winter.

At this time of year, we can find houseplants have become dusty, gathered a few cobwebs and may even be shedding some leaves.

This is quite natural but, by giving your plants a good clean and tidy up now, you’ll give them the best start for winter.

All plants create their food through a process known as photosynthesis, where sunlight triggers a reaction converting the water and nutrients taken up through the roots into useable nutrition.

The greater the supply of light, the more potential there is for plants to create food.

With lower light levels in winter, plants usually only generate sufficient nutrition for maintenance whilst the increased light in summer provides sufficient light for real growth and development.

This is why we recommend feeding plants more regularly in summer so that they can access sufficient nutrients to make food using the abundant light.

Conversely, if you feed too much in winter, the insufficient light levels result in an excess of unused nutrients in the compost which, in very extreme cases, can even lead to toxicity.

As your houseplants respond naturally to the changing seasons, the influence of light levels is quite visible.

You’ll see the plant produce buds and grow additional foliage in spring to capture the extra summer light.

In autumn, the plant will drop old, inefficient leaves so that it only needs to support the strong, healthy leaves that will be most efficient in converting the available light into food.

With abundant light during summer, the plants may tolerate shading caused by dust, whereas in winter it’s important to remove dust so that as much light as possible is available to them.

By simply cleaning the foliage in autumn, you’ll make a considerable difference to the health of your houseplants over winter.

There’s no great mystery to cleaning the leaves of your houseplants: gently wiping the foliage with a clean, damp cloth will usually do the trick.

If you can collect rainwater, this natural source of water is even better for wiping down the leaves (and indeed for watering your plants too). If you have plants with particularly small leaves, a small, clean, dry paintbrush works very well and can reach parts that the cloth can’t.

Although we might not often get warm summer showers in East Lothian, putting houseplants out during one a is a great way of naturally giving them a quick wash-down!

Clearly, this is how our garden plants naturally keep their foliage clean, but outdoor plants can tolerate a wider range of temperatures whereas houseplants can be adversely affected if it’s too cold.

However, you could easily simulate this by giving your plant a shower in the bathroom with some tepid water!

There are products available that give the leaves on your houseplant a great shine and this looks particularly pleasing on plants with large, glossy leaves.

They also help the leaves resist dust and help them breathe more easily.

Baby Bio Leaf Shine is an excellent product if you’d like to add some extra shine but be careful to follow the instructions.

Hopefully, this gives you some help in getting your houseplants winter-ready so that they can continue to efficiently improve the quality of your indoor air.

Some plants are more effective in purifying the air than others, and you’ll find more information on our website at www.merryhatton.co.uk

As always, our experienced plant team would be pleased to help you choose the plant that’s best for you and your home – just pop in and they’ll be delighted to chat plants with you!