My neighbor insisted that talking to my plants does nothing. So I tested it for 3 months.

About 4 months ago, my retired neighbor Margaret saw me out on the porch talking to my monstera and gave me this look. She said 'you know plants don't have ears, right?' and laughed it off. I got curious so I decided to run my own little experiment. I picked two identical spider plants from the same nursery, same soil, same window spot. One I talked to every morning for 5 minutes while I drank my coffee, the other I just watered and ignored. After 3 months the one I talked to had put out 4 new shoots and the leaves were way greener. The quiet one looked kinda sad and only grew a little bit. I'm not saying the words made it grow, but maybe the CO2 from breathing near it or something helped. Has anyone else tried something like this and seen a difference?

2 comments

2 Comments

grace_knight194d ago

Oh man, just talk to them. It totally works, I swear by it.

fiona_carr263d ago

Tried the direct approach with my neighbor after months of awkward hellos in the hallway. Honestly felt stupid at first just walking up and saying "hey, I'm Fiona" but it broke everything wide open. @grace_knight19 you're totally right about just talking to them, it really does cut through all the weird tension. We ended up chatting for like 20 minutes about our dogs and now she watches my place when I'm out of town. The hard part is just starting the conversation but after that first bit it's smooth sailing. I was always scared of being annoying or interrupting something but people are usually nicer than we give them credit for.