It was a gift when I was recovering from surgery in November 2004. My first peace lily.
So simple to care for. Add water after the leaves wilt and droop. The plant recovers within 12 hours. Mine thrived until last fall. But it never bloomed. I’ve been told over watering them will kill them. Otherwise they are idiot proof.
Nearly 2/3 of it suddenly died last fall. The few surviving stalks look lonely in the big pot. I plan to buy a replacement.
12 years for a houseplant. That pretty common? Especially peace lilies?
I have a friend who has huge indoor plants (Philodendrons ) in large planters. She keeps them in a room where they get plenty of indirect sunlight and she waters them (and all her other plants) religiously but just when appropriate. Her plants are over 40 years old and have outlasted four husbands, three kids (now grown), and innumerable moves, and yet they’re still very healthy and look great.
My peace lily is named “Sir Ernest Shackleton.” He should be dead. I got him a year or so after college, and he’s still here 8 years later. He doesn’t thrive, but he survives.
I have a lot of old plants. I think the youngest were purchased when I moved to a new office 5years ago. Some of the ones at home are 15 years now. I don’t think we have any older than that because we gave away the houseplants when we moved from CA to WA.
I had a peace lily (affectionately known as Droopy) for over 10 years. He only flowered once, with one single flower, but it lasted for months. He survived everything (neglect, overwatering, repeated use as a kitty salad bar) until this past Christmas when I put him in the spare bedroom to make room for the decorations… and forgot to water him for over a month. :smack:
Droopy II came along in March and is growing like a weed, thankfully.
My oldest houseplant is a tiny cactus I picked up at the grocery store for $1.99 back in the early 90s.
My oldest house plant is either a Christmas cactus whose origins have been lost to history or a spider plant that I’ve had since at least 1990. The spider plant gets watered regularly, at least three or four times a year, but still survives somehow.
We have lots of old house plants (20-30 years old) including a lily. It is very happy and blooms every year. Several of the plants have been drastically pruned to get them back down to a reasonable size. We just pruned about 7 feet off multiple stems of our Dracaena marginata and it is already sending up new stems. Next we will have to tackle a rubber tree that is bumping the ceiling.
I had a glass vase containing a gorgeous little betta, it was a ‘thing’ some time ago to sell these with a peace lilly plonked on top, roots in the water. I thought all peace lillies grew that way. (I shudder to think of the poor little fish who lived in that vase, I hope they were fed and had their water changed.) But I don’t know how long the peace lilly lived. I once sent away for a terrarium, a little plastic flying saucer with tiny 1" plants in it. They all died except one, a schefflera, that grew and grew and lived at least 12 years. I repotted it several times.
I have a jade plant that is between 40 to 45 years old. My mom grew it from a cutting she took from her mom’s very old jade plant. She brought the cutting illegally from Germany–she scared me to death doing that. I used to tell her to put all the illegal stuff in her suitcase so I could at least try to bail her out.
My MIL has a rubber tree still going strong from before I married Mistermage (25 years ago). She gave us a cutting and I managed to grow a second one from that one but… the next 2 houses have not had window placements suitable for growing indoor plants.
While I would grow indoor plants because “why not” I think all my cats would like more than the 2 regular sized windows that get south facing sunlight. I don’t count the kitchen or bathroom windows because 1) the cats aren’t supposed to be on that counter (kitchen) and 2) the counter is too low (bathroom).
My parents have a plant of some kind that they got when they moved into their first house in Indiana. Thing was chilling in its pot just fine and living. My mom suggested getting a bigger pot on a lark and the thing sprung way up and even grew little companion plants…25 years later!
I had to give a tearful goodbye to Mr. Cactus. We got him when the Packers won the Super Bowl in 96 (he has googly eyes and a cheesehead). He was in my parents basement for years barely getting water (how he got sun I have no idea) and I took him with me to Charlotte 20 years later where he had a brief resurgence. Moved to Florida where he suddenly died =(
