There are many pothos varieties but the Snow queen pothos is the most popular. Because it produces very beautiful leaves. 70% of the heart shape leaf is white and 30% is green. The combination of white and green looks awesome.
Snow pothos is evergreen vines. It can grow up to 10 feet easily. The best part of snow pothos is you can grow them in containers, hanging baskets, and as ground cover.
If you are living in USA zones 10 to 11 you can grow snow queen as ground cover without much care. The temperature in these parts of the country is safe to grow snow pothos outdoors.
Before growing them indoors you need to know about the Snow Queen pothos care techniques. Vine plants should care differently than other houseplants. Therefore, pay close attention to the below-written steps. If necessary, make notes to take quick actions.
Below written snow queen care steps are best to care indoor growing snow queen pothos. Outdoor growing snow queen does not need care like indoor pothos. Because they get most of the care from mother nature.
Quick Care Guide
| Common Names | Snow queen Pothos, Epipremnum Aureum |
| Size | 10 to 26 feet under ideal growing conditions |
| Light | 5 to 6 hours |
| Soil | Free-draining |
| Water | Check the soil before watering |
| Temperature & Humidity | 16 to 30 Degrees C, Low to high |
| Toxicity | Cats, Dogs, and Children |
| Pest & Diseases | Thrips, mealybugs, Brown spots, root rot |
How to grow snow queen pothos?
When you go for buying snow pothos from the garden store. You need to check the two things. One is the plant container. No doubt the container should look fancy. But the main point is it should have a bottom drainage hole. This drainage system saves plants from extra water.
The second thing you need to check is the backside of plant leaves. It should be neat and clean. If you see bugs or spots plant leaves do not buy it. They garden store may give you some discount of such infected plants but say big no.
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Below is the Snow Queen Pothos Care Guide
Light
Extreme bright light is not good for a snow queen care. The plant needs 5 to 6 hours of direct sunlight. Put your plants in direct sunlight in the morning time. Then move the plant pot to in-direct bright light after 12 pm.
Do this on daily basis.
If doing so is not easy for you then find a place in your home where queen pothos can get in-direct Sunlight. This plant needs 8 to 9 hours of indirect bright light to full fill its light requirements.
Note that continuous direct sun rays can damage the plant leaves. Discolored leaves and poor white variegation are the results of excess direct sunlight.
On the other side,
If your plant is leggy and overstretched this means the plant is in the low light environment. Move the pot to give it bright light and it will recover soon.
Control the light by moving the plant container to the right place. It will stay green and thrive for many months. Remember that light directly affects the color combination and number of leaves per vine.
Watering
Less water is another secret of success. This plant is not a thirsty plant-like rainforest plants. It needs very less water as compared to them. This means less work for you.
Giving more than sufficient water to plants leads to root rot and it is not always a fixable disease.
Vining plants like pothos easily get infected by root rot-like diseases. The only possible reason is extra water in the potting soil.
More water does not mean more leaves, it means more problems. For watering snow queen pothos follow the golden watering method.
In this technique, we use the index finger and check the soil moisture in the upper 2 inches. The soil should be dry. If it is dry then give it some water, If the soil has moisture wait for few days.
In short, it is best for you to grow to snow queen on a little dry side. This means the plant can thrive in little dry conditions. But it cannot handle one extra cup of water.
This is the reason you need to choose the plant container with the bottom draining hole. Some pots have one big hole and others have 2 to 3 small holes.
This type of plant pots helps to save plants in over water conditions.
The holes are there to let the extra water drain easily and quickly out of the pot.
Temperature & Humidity
The ideal temperature range is 16 to 30 Degrees C. When the temperature drops below 16 Degrees C the plant starts suffering from cold.
It is clear that this plant needs warm conditions to thrive. Therefore, you need to move the plant pot inside when the temperature drops below the low limit.
It cannot handle the frost so move it inside or you will lose the plant.
Those who like to grow it outdoors should take the plant cuttings. To plant it inside in pots, just a few days before the frost. This way you can again have outdoor growing snow queen by transferring them outside in spring and summer. But this is a time-consuming task and it needs efforts.
Other than temperature, humidity is the second crucial part. No doubt like other pothos, snow queen can tolerate the low humidity.
But the snow queen pothos care guide recommends high humid places. Because snow queen pothos thrives like crazy in high humidity. Also, produce more vibrant shining leaves.
To increase the humidity, you can use electronic devices such as humidifiers. If you already have one it is good. But do not buy it just for a single plant, it will be a costly idea.
If you are growing multiple plants then you can go and buy humidifiers.
For one or two plants use pebble tray methods. Fill it with water and put a plant pot on it. This will work like magic in all seasons.
The most common method is misting water on plant leaves. In summers mist water twice a week on plants. This will surely help plants to grow in hot low humid weather.
Soil
The soil decides the size and health of a plant. When you grow plants in pots. You need to pay special attention to the plant soil. You cannot use normal garden soil in plant pots. For indoor growing plants, we have many options in the market.
For snow, queen pothos care always uses free-draining soil. Free draining soil means soil that has excellent draining abilities. You can further increase its draining speed by adding 30% perlite in it.
No organic mixed soil is necessary because the snow queen plants do need many fertilizers.
The soil that we use for growing cactus plants is perfect for growing and caring for snow queens. The interesting thing is you are not limited to cactus soil. You can use any well-draining houseplant soil.
Fertilizer
Many growers suggest that the pothos do not need fertilizers. But I use liquid fertilizers for my pothos and they thrive like crazy. It is up to you how you want to grow your plants. because most of the growers argue that we should only use fertilizers for flowering plants.
But not everybody likes flower plants. People like me love to grow foliage plants. Therefore, I Know your pothos do need a few nutrients for better growth.
I like to use liquid synthetic fertilizer for my pothos. Once I use fish fertilizer and it spread a smell all over the place. After that, I only use synthetic fertilizers. These are good for plants and give quick results.
Fertilize pothos in the growing stage, do not give nutrients on winter days. Fertilize your plants thrive in their growing season by diluting the liquid fertilizer with water.
Pruning
The snow queen plants grow up to 10 feet under normal growing conditions. In its natural habitat the plant produces 8 inches long leaves and vines grow more than 10 feet. This incredible growth is not possible in container plants.
Container snow queen pothos care is easy and more manageable.
Use sharp shears to cut the overgrowth of the plant. Then use the cuttings to grow more plants same as the parent plant.
You also have to remove the infected leaves, yellow leaves. At once you can remove 37 % of the plant, only if it is affected by serious disease.
Repotting
Repotting is the tricky part in snow queen pothos care. This plant like its roots too tightly packed. In fact, most of the vine plants like tight root balls.
Only repot the plant into a new pot once the roots are overly tight in the old container and the container is totally full.
You can recognize it by checking the root length. If the roots are coming out of the bottom draining hole then repot it.
The second thing you need to check is the upper layer of soil. When the roots are sneaking out of the upper level of soil. Then this means that plant need a little bigger pot.
For repotting snow queen pothos use a 1 to 2 inches wider pot than the current pot. This way you can save the plant from excess soil moisture. Because large pots hold a large amount of soil. More soil means it can absorb a high amount of water. This will surely increase the chances of root rot.
Propagation
There are many ways by which you can multiply your plant. But my job is to tell you the easy and more successful way of snow queen pothos propagation.
Stem cutting is an easy way of propagation. Here are the final steps.
Look for the healthy stem. It should be a minimum of 5 inches long with 2 or more leaves.
Then use sharp sears and cut the stem 1 inch below the node. Node is the place where the leaves attach to the stem.
Then put the end of the stem in the jar of clean fresh water.
After sometime you will see the stem produces roots.
At this time take it out of the water jar and transfer it to the potting soil.
Put the pot in the warm, indirect bright light.
Toxicity
The snow pothos are toxic to cats, dogs, and children. keep the plant away from them. If the plant is ingested then it can cause mouth irritation, stomach pain, dizziness, and vomiting.
It is equally toxic to humans and pets. The toxic effect is only possible if ingested in large quantities.
If your only symptom in your pests or children call the doctor right away and tell him/her about the toxicity of the plant.
This will help them to find a cure fast and easily.
Pests& disease
Like every other plant snow queen pothos also get some common pests and plant diseases. The list is a little longer. But the good news is these pests and diseases are easy to identify and much easier to resolve.
Pothos are easy to grow plants. If you care your snow queen pothos properly, they will stay healthy. If unfortunately, they will get pests or disease follow our below-written steps and save your plants.
Thrips
These are the small size black color insects that you can found on plant leaves. Once you see them you have to get rid of them asap. Because they suck the plant juice from the leaves and make its nutrients deficient. The plant starts dying slowly.
Take the plant to the shower and rinse the plant. This will remove most of them. The remaining remove by using alcohol wipes.
Then at last use neem oil and spray on the plant leaves. This will kill their eggs and your plant will thrive in just a few days.
Mealybugs
If you see white powder on the plant leaves this means mealybugs are there. Like thrives they suck the plant nutrients and multiply their population. To stop them you need to identify them first.
Once you know that are mealybugs use insecticidal soap to kill all of them in a minute? Then again same rule applies. Use neem oil and spray it on all parts of the plant. This will prevent them from coming back in the future
Root rot
This is the common plant disease in houseplants. Root rot is a fungus that kills plant roots. Excess water and wet soil give birth to root fungus. The fungi bacteria cannot survive in dry conditions. It needs wet conditions to thrive.
The good news is you can easily save your plants from this disease. The best effective step is taking out the plant from the pot. Remove the affected parts of the roots. Wash the plant pot and use new potting soil and plant it again in the same pot.
Yellow leaves and brown spots
Yellow leaves trigger by the two conditions one is over water and the second is low light. Because the plant needs indirect light. the low light conditions are less possible. Most of the time yellow leaves are triggered by the excess water in the plant pot.
Check the soil if it feels wet then water is the culprit. Take the plant out of the pot. Check for the root fungus and plant it again in the same pot. But before that use fresh dry soil.
Your plant will become green and vibrant in few days.
Brown spots on plant leaves are also triggered by the extra water in the plant pot. The above method is the only solution. This will solve almost every internal problem of the plant.
