Health Diagnoses
Find out what is wrong with your plant, and whether it can be saved
Yellowing leaves, brown tips, dropped foliage, or a plant that just stopped: in one visit I identify what is actually going on, tell you honestly whether it can recover, and leave you a step-by-step plan.
Flat $185 house call from Sarasota to Port Charlotte. Two hours, written plan included. Virtual consults from $65.
What a diagnosis visit looks like
- Full inspection of the plant, its soil, its roots, and its spot: light, drafts, humidity, and watering history.
- Identification of the cause: overwatering, underwatering, light stress, nutrient deficiency, pests, disease, or a combination.
- An honest verdict. If the plant can be saved, you get the plan. If it cannot, I tell you that too, and what to do differently next time.
- A written recovery plan within 48 hours, plus a follow-up call a week later to check progress.
The usual suspects
Most sick houseplants in Southwest Florida are not diseased. Overwatering kills more of them than anything else, and a wilting plant in wet soil is drowning, not thirsty. After that come light mismatches, AC drafts drying out tropical foliage, rootbound pots, and pests that went unnoticed until leaves started to speckle. Palms and sagos add their own wrinkle: they pull nutrients from old fronds to feed new growth, so the yellow you see may be a feeding problem, not a dying plant.
Guessing is expensive. Plant owners often spend months on fertilizer or new pots for a plant with a watering problem. One diagnosis replaces the guesswork.
Plants I diagnose most often
Monsteras and other aroids, fiddle-leaf figs, orchids, ferns, indoor palms, succulents that mysteriously collapsed, and the potted palms and sagos on lanais and patios that never quite look right.
Common questions
Can you tell me from a photo if my plant can be saved?
Often I can narrow it down from a photo, which is why the booking form has a photo upload. But root rot, nutrient deficiencies, and several pest problems look alike from a distance, so a firm answer usually needs an in-person look at the soil, the roots, and where the plant lives.
Do you treat the plant, or just diagnose it?
You leave the visit with a written treatment plan: exactly what to change or apply, in what amounts, and on what schedule. Most fixes are things you can do yourself the same week, and treatment can also fold into a maintenance visit so I handle it for you.
What if the plant is already too far gone?
Then I tell you that honestly, along with why it declined, so the same thing does not happen to its replacement or its neighbors. Knowing the cause is worth as much as the save.
Worried about a plant? Get an answer this week.
A full 2-hour house call is a flat $185, with diagnosis, treatment plan, and written care guide included. Or start with a $65 virtual consult.