I'm struggling to grow my Japanese holly fern in my hot dry 1 bedroom apartment. I can water it twice a week and still find it practically dead and severely wilted. Today is one of those days. I'm desperate to save it. In a fit of panic I broke through the dead root ball and replaced some of the soil, but I really need a better mix. I'm so frustrated because this is 2nd generation to one of my first houseplants that I've had since the late 1990's. That one thrived in the basement but died as soon as I tried to grow it in a room similar to my apartment. I was lucky to find sprouts from the basement that I grew it originally. I got one of them to grow when I lived with my grandma and had a basement. But now I don't. I don't want to lose this plant, but it's not thriving and never has gotten as great as I had when I could grow it in a basement. The main problem I see is the soil drying out.

I'm also noticing lots of brown burned areas on the leaves. I suspect because of the dehydrating/hydrating cycles. I wish I could get the plant to stop wilting so I stop getting those brown marks/spots.

What type of soil should I use and will the act I did kill the plant?

There are spores on the leaves. As a last resort, how should I go about propagating those?

This post was edited by fieldofflowers on Fri, Jan 16, 15 at 1:19