Tuesday, February 17, 2009

House Plants Filter Indoor Air

I am a huge fan of growing house plants! I used to have a black thumb that killed anything I came in contact with but somehow I turned that poor thing green and now grow over 25 plants inside my house. It is amazing how fast plants can clean indoor air, ridding the house or office of old smells like smoke or chemicals in as quick as 48 hours - making a safer environment to breath in. If you keep your plants healthy by giving them good soil, don't over water, and get plants from local growers who didn't blast them with chem fertilizers and pesticides then you should have almost no probs growing some greenies in your space. (Even if your thumb isn't so green!)

Here's the official Wikipedia list of house plants that filter your indoor air:

"The first list of air filtering plants was compiled by NASA as part of the NASA Clean Air Study, which researched ways to clean air in space stations. As well as absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, as all plants do, these plants also eliminate significant amounts of benzene, formaldehyde and/or trichloroethylene.
English Ivy (Hedera helix)
Spider plant (Chlorophytum comosum)
Golden pothos or Devil's ivy (Scindapsus aures or Epipremnum aureum)
Peace lily (Spathiphyllum 'Mauna Loa')
Chinese evergreen (Aglaonema modestum)
Bamboo palm or reed palm (Chamaedorea sefritzii)
Snake plant or mother-in-law's tongue (Sansevieria trifasciata 'Laurentii')
Heartleaf philodendron (Philodendron oxycardium, syn. Philodendron cordatum)
Selloum philodendron (Philodendron bipinnatifidum, syn. Philodendron selloum)
Elephant ear philodendron (Philodendron domesticum)
Red-edged dracaena (Dracaena marginata)
Cornstalk dracaena (Dracaena fragans 'Massangeana')
Janet Craig dracaena (Dracaena deremensis 'Janet Craig')
Warneck dracaena (Dracaena deremensis 'Warneckii')
Weeping Fig (Ficus benjamina)
Gerbera Daisy or Barberton daisy (Gerbera jamesonii)
Pot Mum or Florist's Chrysanthemum (Chrysantheium morifolium)
Rubber Plant (Ficus elastica)
Top performers for removing formaldehyde.
Boston fern (Nephrolepis exaltata "Bostoniensis")
Florist's mum(Chrysanthemum morifolium)
Gerbera daisy (Gerbera jamesonii)
Dwarf date palm (Phoenix roebelenii)
Janet Craig (Dracaena deremensis "Janet Craig")
Bamboo palm (Chamaedorea sefritzii)
Kimberly queen fern (Nephrolepis obliterata)
Rubber plant (Ficus elastica)
English ivy (Hedera helix)
Weeping fig (Ficus benjamina)
Peace lily (Spathiphyllum sp.)
Top performers for removing xylene and toluene.
Areca palm (Chrysalidocarpus lutescens)
Dwarf date palm (Phoenix roebelenii)
Moth orchid (Phalenopsis sp.)
Dumb cane (Camilla) (Dieffenbachia camilla)
Dragon Tree (Dracaena marginata)
Dendrobium orchid (Dendrobium sp.)
Dumb cane (Exotica) (Dieffenbachia "Exotica Compacta')
King of hearts (Homalomena wallisii)
Kimberly queen fern (Nephrolepis obliterata)
Warneckei (Dracaena deremensis "Warneckei")
The recommendation of NASA is to use 15 to 18 good-sized houseplants in six- to eight-inch (203 mm) diameter containers in a 1,800-square-foot (170 m2) house."

Happy Growing and Happy Breathing!
xoxo

1 comment:

  1. Perfect timing Leslie,
    Just bloggered over at Canary about lawn to garden stuff, and then here for inside the house planting.

    Thanks for the totally extensive list of choices. We are getting closer to being two old beings in our tiny house, and hanging plants would be such a beautiful touch. When we live in Hawaii, everything grows all the time, outside ... now things are different, and the idea of green growing along our stainless sheet walls makes me cry with tears of 'OMIGODDESS ... creative solution/artistic mixing it up!

    Thanks again for your genie in the box sharing. Cheers! Mokihana

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