Plant Health Starts At The ROOT
Roots are a plants stability and connection to life.
Plant roots carry water and essential minerals to the rest of the plant, strong root systems are absolutely vital to their health and survival. If the roots are unwell so is the plant, if the roots are healthy as seen here, the plant has a foundation for starting off its growth cycle with greater success.
The importance of healthy roots can not be stressed enough.
Roots are how a plant eats, drinks and thereby supports the plant to produces its leaves/fruits/seeds. As a plant grows its roots work as a storage unit saving water, nutrients and large quantities of food, even storing to protect the plant from times of drought for later use. (Amazing right!)
When growing, healthy roots equate to healthy plants, which in turns leads to successful transplanting with less shock to the plants.
What to identify for healthy roots—
white or tan in color, supple and succulent looking with many off shoots, should often hold a lobe shape as seen in picture above.
If plant roots are brown and crumbly, this is a sure sign the plant is unhealthy and will likely transplant but will take extra time to recover, slowing down growth.
If the roots of the plant or seedling are very thin & small and don’t hold the shape of the soil, they’re probably just yet immature – the plant will still be healthy, but is not ready for transplant.
PFC Reminder —Plant roots need oxygen for respiration to grow, having looser aerated soil keeps plants healthy and makes for more vigorous root systems. If soil is to wet or compacted there will be less room for oxygen to circulate and can lead to root rot and root loss.
Questions To Contemplate: Am I supporting healthy roots in my plants? Am I practicing deep and infrequent watering vs overwatering which leads to root rot and shallow root systems? Am I supporting the best foundation for my plants?
