Growing Pothos: The Beginner Plant That Rewards a Reservoir

Pothos (Epipremnum aureum) is the houseplant most people own first, because it is almost impossible to kill. It is also the houseplant most people grow badly: a few long, bare vines with leaves only at the ends, in a pot that has been dry for a week. The gap between a surviving pothos and a thriving one is small and mostly comes down to three habits. Here is the whole care routine, including the part about pots that made the biggest difference for us.

Which pothos

They are all the same species with different variegation, and variegation decides light needs. Golden pothos (green with yellow splashes) is the standard and tolerates the widest range. Jade pothos (plain green) grows fastest in low light and is the best choice for a north window. Marble queen and manjula (heavily white) need bright indirect light or they lose their pattern and grow slowly. Neon (chartreuse) wants medium to bright light to stay bright. If you are unsure, buy golden.

Light

Bright indirect is ideal: near an east window, a few feet from a south or west one, or right at a north one. Direct afternoon sun bleaches and scorches the leaves. In low light the plant survives but leaves get smaller and further apart on the stem, which is where the sparse look comes from. If your pothos looks stringy, more light is the first fix. Hanging it in the upper part of a window, rather than on a shelf across the room, is usually all it takes.

Water

Pothos wants the soil to dry partway down between waterings but not to dry out completely. In a regular pot that means watering when the top inch or two is dry, roughly weekly in summer and every two weeks in winter. Overwatering shows as yellow leaves and black stems; underwatering shows as drooping and then brown crispy edges. It bounces back from underwatering; it does not always bounce back from rot.

This is where the reservoir comes in. Pothos is a moisture-loving aroid from the forest floor, and in a self-watering pot it gets exactly the even, never-soggy moisture it wants. In our experience a pothos moved from a regular pot into a reservoir pot roughly doubles its growth rate in the first season and stops dropping lower leaves. The two-week transition after repotting matters (top-water until the roots find the wick), and letting the reservoir run dry for a couple of days between fills keeps the roots healthy. After that it is a glance at the water window every ten days.

Soil and pot

Any peat- or coir-based indoor mix with some perlite. Pothos is not fussy. Pot size: one size up from the nursery pot at repotting, and repot every year or two when roots circle the bottom. Pothos does not mind being slightly rootbound. It does mind sitting in a saucer of water, so drainage or a proper reservoir, never a sealed cachepot without care.

For a hanging pothos, a 10-inch self-watering hanging planter gives it room to become a large plant over a few years without daily watering. For a shelf or sill, a 7- or 8-inch reservoir pot.

Pruning: the secret to a full plant

A pothos grows from the tip of each vine. Left alone, it produces a few very long vines and nothing new near the pot. To get a full, bushy plant, cut. Every few months, trim the longest vines back by a third to a half, cutting just after a leaf node (the bump where a leaf meets the stem). The plant responds by branching from nodes closer to the pot. It feels brutal the first time and looks better within a month.

You can also lay a long vine back across the top of its own pot and pin it to the soil at a couple of nodes with a bent paperclip; it roots there and fills the bare center.

Propagation: free plants

Every cutting you take is a new plant. Cut a piece of vine with at least two nodes, remove the lowest leaf, and put the cut end in a glass of water on a windowsill. Roots appear in one to three weeks. When they are an inch or two long, pot several cuttings together in one pot for an instantly full plant, or add them to the parent pot. Change the water weekly while they root. Cuttings can also go straight into moist soil, but water rooting lets you see progress and is more reliable for beginners.

Feeding

A balanced liquid houseplant fertilizer at half strength once a month from March to September. Nothing in winter. In a reservoir pot, feed by adding the diluted fertilizer to the top-watering during a monthly flush rather than to the reservoir, so salts do not concentrate in the tank.

Problems

Yellow leaves, mostly lower ones. Overwatering, or simply old leaves being shed. If the stems are firm, ignore; if soft and dark, dry out the plant.

Brown crispy tips. Dry air or erratic watering. A reservoir fixes the second; grouping plants helps the first.

Small pale new leaves, long gaps between them. Not enough light. Move it.

Loss of variegation. Same cause; move a variegated pothos to brighter light or accept green leaves.

Mealybugs (white cottony spots in leaf joints). Dab with rubbing alcohol on a cotton swab; repeat weekly.

Note that pothos is toxic to cats and dogs if chewed, which is one more reason it belongs in a hanger. Give it good light, a reservoir pot, and a haircut every season, and the plant that everyone starts with becomes the one that fills the window.