The Human Plant Relationship: Are Your Clients Killing Plants?

After twenty years of horticulture experience, I feel fairly proficient at selecting varieties of foliage to survive in certain indoor locations.  I often get the comment, “You must have a green thumb.” Normally, I respond by saying, “Plants are like people. If you know the type of environment they prefer, the more likely they’ll thrive.” I often associate plants with human qualities and wonder if that’s a subconscious thing. However, the more I work with plants, the more I believe the human plant relationship is more connected than we realize. 

An example of this I’ve personally experienced is certain office locations where I can’t keep a plant alive.  Over the years, I’ve had particular offices that I dread to enter in order to service the plants.

One of those offices was inside a big mortgage lender. Stress levels seemed to run high and the executive never appeared to be in a good mood. 

It seemed the plant would slowly go downhill each week, no matter how tough the type of foliage. Even if it was the almost indestructible mass cane that can tolerate low light, drought, and neglect, the plant would start to die. 

There was plenty of light, no sign of disease, perfect water levels and yet, I couldn’t figure out why this was happening.  I would joke to myself that it was the executive’s bad vibes, killing my plants. 

On the flip side, I have certain offices where there are very temperamental foliage varieties that thrive despite their environment.  

For instance, there is a ficus benjamina over two decades old that has a beautiful full head of foliage and rarely drops a leaf, stuck in a low light office corner.  The female executive that occupies that room is always welcoming, a pleasure to talk to and has personal plants surrounding her. It’s the only ficus benjamina tree I’ve ever been able to keep alive in an office. That’s another instance, I joke to myself, in which it must be her good vibes keeping it growing. 

Recently, I’ve been dealing with another similar office situation where I’m continually changing out Janet Craig compacta canes. 

These are very hardy, low-light tolerant plants and much more pricey than your average foliage.  There are eight other Janet Craig compacta canes in the building that are doing well so why are just the ones in this office failing?

No sign of disease, good soil moisture levels, no drafts and can’t figure out why the very same plants can’t survive here.  Last week, I struck up a conversation with the young lady who occupies the office. She literally called herself a “plant murderer” since any plant she took home always ended up dying. While her mother had plants growing everywhere, the woman occupying the office with the Janet Craig canes didn’t seem to inherit her mother’s green thumb. Could it be, this young woman’s perception that she is a “plant murderer” be affecting mine?

Seems insane unless you’ve heard about the controversial human plant relationship studies that began on a bored polygrapher’s whim.  

In the 1960’s Cleve Backster was America’s top lie-detector examiner and decided one day to attach the electrodes from his galvanometer to the mass cane near his desk.  Realizing it hadn’t been watered in a while, he postulated that the lie detector needle should start to move once the plant absorbed fresh water since the machine measures the electrical conductivity of moisture. Not getting the results he expected, Backster decided to try something more extreme.  

Backster theorized if he threatened his plant, perhaps the meter would show that emotion.  Dunking one of the leaves in his hot coffee didn’t cause any response. However, when he thought about the act of burning one of the leaves, the meter began to jump.  This shocked him, as the implication was that his desk plant could read his thoughts.  

From there, he began a series of experiments studying the human plant relationship.

Most of these are documented in the book “The Secret Life of Plants.” It’s filled with a variety of tests that Backster and others conducted examining the human plant relationship.  

Some of these tests indicated that when a plant’s owner was experiencing flight anxiety during take-off, the galvanometer was registering the plant going through an emotional response at the same time. Other experiments implied plants could pick out individuals who had previously destroyed plants.  

There’s no doubt that there’s connection in the human plant relationship, as there are numerous studies on biophilia that indicate tangible benefits for humans when plants are included in a built environment. 

However, I’m uncertain of what else to fault for the unexplained plant turnover. Have any other interiorscapers encountered this, and how did you find a solution?