How to Prune Pothos: See Them Establish Healthier Grounds

How to prune pothos is a task that you must take into consideration, because it will result in a bushier and healthier development. These plants are excellent for beginners looking to get their hands dirty with new plants.

One of the main maintenance requirements of this plant is having to prune it. Today, we’re breaking down a step-by-step on how to correctly prune your pothos plants and have them look even healthier than before.

How To Prune Pothos in a Few Steps?

To prune pothos in a few steps you must pick the right to do so, gather your resources and disinfect them. Then, start to eliminate the diseased, faded, or discolored leaves. Chop off the plant’s congested parts, but avoid cutting close to the node, and trim the plant frequently.

Your pothos will be able to produce a new vine from the location where the cut was made if you cut above this growth node. Trimming will only result in your trailing plant being stunted for a while because pruning is one of the best strategies to promote the fresh, healthy development of the plant.

To give it the best opportunity, prune correctly by cutting just above a growth node. These plants generate well-kept trailing vines, which can be used to wrap baskets, shelves, or even an indoor trellis.

Pruning is beneficial for all pothos species; but change the frequency of your pruning schedule to correspond with your pothos plant’s growth rate, especially the fast-growing variants like Snow Queen and Marble Queen tend to be more popular variations of pothos.

1. Pick The Right Time

If you notice your pothos plant is getting a bit too big for its pot or container, or its leaves are sticking out and possibly blocking it from growth, you may need to prune it. Trimming a large plant helps it return to smaller spaces and sometimes look healthier.

Seasonally speaking, your beautiful plant should be pruned at its best in the spring, summer, and early fall. This is because the plant will be able to recover from whatever pruning you undertake quickly and with little stress. After all, it is actively growing during these times.

They will develop and produce new leaves if you prune them while it is in the growing season. Pothos will, on average, take one to two months to regrow new leaves after being chopped, which is why you need to pick the right time to do so, as it will have time to grow and thrive.

If necessary, pothos can be pruned in the winter, but because this isn’t the plant’s growing season, you risk overstressing it, which could lead to longer-term harm.

2. Gather Resources and Disinfect Them

You should start by getting everything ready. This will significantly speed up the procedure. A good set of pruning shears or scissors and a container to catch the pothos leaves as you chop them off are required.

For this, a trash bin or bag will be ideal. Also, ensure that your equipment is not old or rusty, which could lead to damaged plants that will be much harder to heal. They may also transmit different diseases or transport

Before beginning your plant-cutting, you should clean your scissors. This will aid in limiting the spread of illness. You can do this by rinsing them at least once with rubbing alcohol or briefly submerging them in hot water.

3. Eliminate Diseased, Fading, or Discolored Leaves

After sterilizing your scissors, you can begin trimming the leaves. Remove any brown, withered, yellow, or otherwise damaged leaves. Moreover, you can cut any leaves of the pothos houseplant that are too long or straggly back, you should aim to remove the ones that would hinder the growth of the plant.

Pothos should also be pruned when any diseased or discolored leaves are seen. Your plant can conserve energy by getting rid of these harmful leaves. Furthermore, it can stop the spread of ailments that affect leaves.

Unfortunately, you should remove any leaves from your plant that is more than 50 percent damaged, infected, or dead. They won’t be able to recover, which will enable your plant to focus nutrients and energy on both new and healthy development. It is especially crucial to remove sick leaves as soon as possible to reduce the amount that the disease spreads to the other leaves of your plant, because they would spread it to the rest of the healthy parts.

Now, you should make careful to dispose of the leaves once you have harvested them properly. You don’t want to infect other plants with any fungal or bacterial infections that may be present on the leaves. Hence, be sure to either burn them or dispose of them, so that they wouldn’t contaminate the rest, as they can even when they are cut off.

4. Chop off the Plant’s Congested Parts

You should prune the plant by picking heavily filled-out parts if there aren’t many weak leaves. By doing this, the plant will experience fresh growth and receive more light and ventilation as well.

While pruning, taking out roughly one-third of the plant material is generally recommended. Nevertheless, you can remove more or less based on the season, good plant health, and preferences.

It is usually best to err on caution and remove less material than more if unsure how much to prune. If more need to be taken out, you can always return and do so, but once leaves have been cut off, they cannot be replaced. With practice, you’ll be able to gauge how much pruning your plant needs and make adjustments as necessary so that you grow pothos in a quite healthy structure.

5.  Avoid Cutting Too Close to the Node

Pothos node cutting could lead to extra damage, which you want to avoid. After selecting a location, cut a quarter-inch or so above the leaf or growth node. For instance, the location you choose on the vine will be between two growth nodes and two sets of leaves, even thought you can grow pothos cuttings, but not from the ones that are cut because they are infested.

The first leaf on the vine will appear after the incision; therefore, you will cut a quarter-inch above the growth node of that leaf. For whichever much you want to remove, repeat the procedure on each vine you want to cut. You might wish to think about trimming any long vines with bare areas or ones lacking leaves.

6. Trim The Rest of Your Plant

After you’ve finished pruning your pothos, continue doing it regularly. Your plant will remain strong, full, and attractive as a result. Try to prune it approximately every few months. In some cases, pruning is used to simply touch up the plant; in other cases, it can help revive it if many leaves have been shed as the vines grow.

Pruning will make pothos bushier. This is so you can encourage new growth when you prune the plant. Hence, give your pothos a good trimming if you want them to be fuller and bushier. To allow the plant to recuperate, take care not to remove too much at once.

Not only will you get healthier plants, but it’s an intelligent method to ensure your pothos houseplants still fit well in your house because the non-variegated varieties grow quickly. If you have kids and pets, in addition to having it in a hanging basket, you probably don’t want it to grow to the ground. By pruning, you may ensure that it stays out of the way of tiny hands and paws.

Conclusion

And now you have a complete step-by-step guide on how to start pruning pothos plants yourself. To recap what we covered in this article:

• When pruning, ensure you’re cutting off any dead leaves or root rot you see in the way. Otherwise, these rotten members of the plant could spread.
• Propagate pothos using most of the healthy cuttings that you made during pruning, which is why you should pick the ones that are healthy and not infested.
• Because pothos plants grow relatively fast, you may need to prune them at least twice a year, and they will keep on trailing.
• Pick the right time to cut the plant because this would encourage the growth and result in a healthy development.

Both novice and seasoned gardeners can benefit from them, and they look excellent as accents in practically any home. So, cutting your pothos is just basic plant care.  So, are you ready to get your pruning scissors?