How to Prevent Your Indoor Plants From Becoming Leggy in the Winter

The stressors of winter can make our beloved houseplants leggy and weak. Legginess occurs when plants are desperate to reach the sunlight and nutrients they need to survive. This article will discuss the symptoms and causes of legginess as well as how to prevent it.

Keeping indoor plants lush and healthy during the winter is difficult for many people. The harsher conditions of winter, such as dry air and less light, can stress out plants and affect their growth habits.

One way that plants adapt during this time is by becoming leggy. In an effort to survive, plants will stretch out and grow toward the little light or nutrients they can detect. Unfortunately, this results in weak, brittle, and leggy growth.

In the sections below, you will learn everything about leggy growth, including the symptoms, causes, and how to prevent it. After reading this article, you will know how to treat leggy growth in your plants and prevent it in the future.

How Do You Tell If Your Indoor Plants Are Becoming Leggy?

Most people don’t identify leggy growth until it has become quite noticeable. But if you want to catch it before it becomes severe, you should look out for the following symptoms.

Weak growth that is elongated toward sunlight
New growth that is weak and floppy
Weak stems that have no firmness or structure.
Stems and growth topple over sides of the pot
New growth is yellow or white instead of green

Vigilance is the best way to prevent your plants from becoming too leggy. By noticing the symptoms right away, you can immediately treat your plant with what it needs to prevent the legginess from becoming worse.

What Causes Plants To Become Leggy?

Many factors can cause plants to become too leggy. Unfortunately, all these factors can easily come into play during wintertime. Below are the four most common reasons why houseplants become leggy in the winter.

Too little light: Plants need sunlight in order to successfully perform photosynthesis and survive. When plants are not receiving enough light, they will grow tall and in odd directions to access the little light they can detect.
Too much or too little water: Providing your plants with either too much or too little water will cause uneven growth. This can result in some stems becoming weak and leggy.
Too much fertilizer: Fertilizer can exacerbate legginess as it encourages plants to grow even when they shouldn’t be. If your plants are already leggy due to lack of sun or water, adding fertilizer will only worsen the problem.
Overcrowding: Some plants can grow quite bushy and become overcrowded in their pots. This means that some stems will receive more light and nutrients than others. The stems that are missing out will try and grow up and outward to gain access to more sunlight. This can easily make the stems weaker and leggier.

How To Prevent Your Plants From Becoming Leggy

Luckily, there are several things you can do to prevent your indoor plants from becoming leggy. The important thing is to ensure that your plants get ample sun, water, and pruning. Below are some suggestions to ensure your plants receive everything they need for even, healthy growth during the winter.

Provide your plants with plenty of light: Placing your plants near a bright window is the best way to prevent legginess. However, make sure to check your plant’s light requirements to ensure it is getting the right amount.
Rotate your plants every time you water them: When you rotate your plants, you’re allowing all sides of the plant to face the light on a regular schedule. This will ensure the plant grows evenly.
Install artificial grow lights: Sometimes, there’s just not enough available sunlight in winter for your plants to achieve optimal growth. In this situation, you might need to install a grow light or two to supplement the light that the plant needs.
Repot your plants before winter: Repotting your plants with a new, fresh potting mix will provide them with the nutrients they need over the colder months. Make sure you do this in late summer or early fall to give your plants enough time to recover from the shock before the colder weather hits.
Prune your plant regularly during the growing season: Keeping your plant well-pruned ensures even growth and avoids those long leggy bits from taking over. This also helps prevent the overcrowding that often contributes to the legginess of a plant.

Pinch back the growing tips of plant stems: Pinching back new growth enables the plant to become bushier and eliminates that long leggy growth. When you pinch out the growth tip, it forces the plant to create two new growth tips at either side of the stem below the cut that you’ve made. This is a great way to make your plant bushier and avoid long, leggy growth.
Increase the humidity: During the winter, the air inside homes is much drier due to the constant use of artificial heating. Unfortunately, this means that houseplants are not getting the humidity that they need and often results in weak growth. To solve this problem, either use a humidifier or mist your plants regularly.

Following the tips in this article will ensure that your plants remain nice and healthy over winter and don’t develop any leggy growth. Make sure your plant is getting the sun, water, and nutrients it needs so that it continues to grow evenly.