Took me 3 hours to figure out why my fiddle leaf fig was dropping leaves

Honestly, I thought I was overwatering it because the soil felt damp. Turns out it was the opposite - I was underwatering it for 5 weeks straight. The leaves just kept falling off one by one and I was getting so frustrated. Finally grabbed a moisture meter from Home Depot for $12 and realized the soil was bone dry an inch down. Now I water it every 6 days like clockwork and it's finally perking up. Has anyone else dealt with a plant that gave totally fake signs of what it actually needed?

2 comments

2 Comments

drew_thomas925d ago

One thing nobody seems to talk about is that the soil itself can mess with your moisture meter readings. I grabbed a cheap meter from Lowes and it kept saying my soil was moist when it was actually dry in certain spots because of compacted potting mix. The roots just couldn't get to the water even when I poured it in. I had to repot my fiddle with a looser mix that had perlite and bark in it to fix the problem. The meter was right about the moisture level but wrong about how the plant could actually use it. So you might be dealing with the same thing if your soil is old or too dense.

lee.casey25d ago

Honestly, that's such a good point. I've had the exact same thing happen where my meter said everything was fine but my plant was clearly suffering, and it's so frustrating. It makes total sense that compacted soil would mess with everything even if the meter is technically right.