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Comment by Plantlover69 | Hacker News Reader

Here's a tip I learned from taking care of house plants for the last year and half.

'Note that when you buy a plant, it usually comes in a "potter's pot" which is a small plastic container meant for temporary use. Ideally, you'd buy new pots (terracotta or ceramic) and re-pot your plant with additional soil.'

Instead of repotting into a new pot, keep the plants in the "potter's pot" and sit that in a nice decorative pot. As house plants grow they will need to be moved to larger pots or even require root maintenance. Getting plants out of a fancy ceramic pot is a lot hard than the thin plastic "potter's pots", and appearance wise they look just as good.

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On the other hand they'll never grow if kept in the potter's pot, which is probably desirable in a houseplant, but personally I would rather watch the plant grow.

I was gifted a monstera adansonii in a fairly small (12cm diameter iirc) pot and it remained more or less the same size for a year or so, but since repotting it a couple of months ago into a 25cm pot and providing a new trellis structure it's grown nearly 30cm and sprouted many more leaves (although it has been all vertical growth so far, I'm hoping it will fill out horizontally once it reaches the top of the trellis). Obviously it would be impractical letting it get to maximum height indoors (around three metres, if I recall correctly), so we probably won't provide it a bigger pot once it reaches the limits of the current one, but seeing it grow has been quite nice.

I attribute part of its success to keeping the plant in the bathroom such that the steam from the shower provides a more tropical climate than the rest of the house and helps moderate its water requirements. I'd like to move it outdoors at some point and let it get to maximum size, but I don't think it would do well in the harsh Australian summer.

I kept a Japanese Peace Lily on my bathroom windowsill in Scotland for a few years. Never watered it once. It thrived, and survived entirely on shower-steam (presumably condensing on the leaves/pot/soil).

They're pretty resilient plants to keep, the way the leaves start to droop when they need watering makes it really easy to take care of them, even for people without particular plant-skills.

Plants from the nursery are often on the verge of being root-bound (if they aren't already) and getting nasty J-roots and the like.

Up-potting is important for overall plant health, regardless of what kind of pots one chooses to use.

Personally, I can't imagine needing to worry about having appropriate inner pots to go along with everything.

Ceramics have different properties than plastic — terra cotta, for instance, wicks more moisture. I don’t disagree with you but it is a point to consider.

Why is it harder to remove them from ceramic pots?

Ceramic pots are heavier, especially at larger sizes, and can be difficult to lift, upturn, generally handle for some people. Also the thin plastic pots have a bit of give allowing one to squeeze them, loosening the soil and root ball, which can make it easier to remove the plant. Otherwise tools might be needed, like a scoop, that can damage to roots.

You can cut a potter's pot with a pair of scissors.

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