Most people buy a $100 Thai Constellation and put it in $10 "All-Purpose" soil. That’s a recipe for root rot in Georgia’s humidity. Standard soil holds too much water. Aroids (Monsteras, Philos) need "breathable" feet.

I’ve been buying house plants for years now, and as my collection has grown, so have my planting ‘supplies’. When I first got started, I didn’t know what sort of substrate would work best, so I did what a lot of people do – I bought a big bag of Miracle Gro soil and started repotting in it. Looking back, I must have gotten really lucky. It took me a while to start seeing gnats, and even when I did start seeing them, there weren’t that many. I controlled them with the usual su