Cercestis - Care tips

Cercestis

The Cercestis is still a pretty unknown plant family, you might even have never heard about it! The Cercestis have a similar look as the Syngonium. They have arrow shaped leaves with a pattern on top. The Cercestis is also a climbing aroid, like the Syngonium. But the biggest difference is that the Cercestis is a slow grower, as opposed to their look-alike Syngoniums. You have to have a lot of patience with the Cercestis, but you get a very rare and stunning plant out of it, sounds like it’s worth it right?

Cercestis Plant Care Tips

The Cercestis originates from Africa, where she lives in a tropical area. Inside your urban jungle she isn’t too fussy about her requirements. She would like to grow in a temperature between 18 and 25 degrees. She will be fine inside a normal house humidity, but will feel extra spoiled when you place her near a humidifier. This makes her also a suitable plant for the bathroom or kitchen, where the humidity is naturally a bit higher. Since she is an aroid, you can provide her with a soil mix suited for aroids. We recommend using a mix of 60% soil, 15% bark, 10% coconut fibre, 10% charcoal and 5% perlite. We have put all the substrates in an aroid potting mix package together, to make it easy for you. :)

Light and placement for Cercestis

The Cercestis would like to grow inside bright, indirect light. Near a South- or North facing window would be great. Just keep in mind that these windows can produce heat in the summer, so you might want to replace your Cercetis at this time of year to prevent her amazing leaves from scorching.

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Water

You can keep the soil slightly moist at all times. You can do this by providing your rare arrow shaped plant by regular small splashes. We recommend you using a pot with holes in the bottom. This can be a terracotta pot, or simply a nursery pot as an inner pot. This helps you with draining excess water from the pot, which can prevent your plant from getting root rot.

Nutrition

During the growing season you can add a portion of PLNTS nutrition to your water every month. This will provide the Cercestis with enough energy to grow. Keep in mind that these plants are slow growers and you will approximately see 3-4 new leaves per year.

Propagating Cercestis

The Cercestis is easy to propagate. You can make stem cuttings with 1 or 2 leaves attached. Cut underneath a node and place it in water or inside soil or another preferred substrate. When you decide to not root it inside water, we recommend that you use some rooting powder. This will enhance the chance of rooting your cutting successfully and faster.

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Most common pests on Cercetis

Since this plant is pretty unknown, the most common pests are not really identified yet. You should always keep your eyes on any pest appearing, like mealybugs, thrips, spider mites and fungus gnats. You can reduce the chance of getting pests by making sure your soil isn’t soggy and by giving your plants regular inspections. If you need any help with diagnosing your itchy problem, then you can go to our PLNTS doctor page. Here you will find all the information you need to determine what pest you're dealing with and how to get rid of it.

Are Cercestis poisonous for your pets or children?

Unfortunately the Cercetis is poisonous to ingest for both humans and animals. That is why we suggest placing this plant on unreachable shelves to protect our beloved children and pets from taking a nibble.

Cercetis plant for sale

Is this rare arrow shaped plant something you are interested in? At PLNTS.com you can buy Cercestis online, like the Cercestis Mirabilis. Whether you like your Cercestis big from the start or prefer to grow them from tiny BabyPLNTS into full-grown PLNTS - we’ve got you covered!