"Cereus-validus" wrote in message
...
Yeah right.

Go ahead and blow on the plants and see what that does.

He said "flowers are shriveled". One reason for that is simply that the
flowers are spent, but the rest of the plant could be fine. He did NOT say
the leaves were shriveled up, brown and dead.

1) Pinch off the dead flowers along with the buds beneath them.

2) Water the bejeezus out of the plant. If the pot has a bottom tray
attached, leave the residual water in the tray until it is absorbed. Don't
spill it out, especially if the soil was extremely dry before watering.

Most nurseries use a soilless mix for potted plants. Often, it's nothing but
peat moss, vermiculite and/or perlite, and some lime to get the pH right.
The main purpose of this mix to that it's disease-free. The disadvantage is
that when the mix (especially the peat moss) dries out completely, it's
tough to get it to absorb water again. It's sort of like a totally dry
sponge. Like the sponge, the soil actually shrinks. You'll notice that it's
actually pulled in from the sides of the pot. You have to re-wet the soil
just to make it ready to behave like soil should. It never will behave
exactly like natural soil, but it's not worth going into the reasons why.

Also: Hanging pots force plants to survive in weird conditions. Put a
sun-loving plant like a petunia or marigold in a sunny garden bed and it'll
thrive. Put the same plant in a pot and it's another story. The temperature
of the pot & soil are at LEAST as hot as the surrounding air, and usually
higher if the pot's in the sun all day. These plants are not designed for
their roots to be that hot. You have to make up for it with extra water. If
you can't provide it, you must either move the pots to a shadier place and
accept somewhat less "performance", or find a way to keep the plants in the
sun, but shade the pots. Finally, you can switch to enormous pots. That's
one of the better solutions, since the typical store-bought hanging pot can
dry out in a few hours while you're at work.