From our perspective deep in the soil, the difference between too much and too little water is a matter of life and suffocation. When you underwater us, our root systems become desperate. We send every tiny root hair searching, straining through the dry soil particles for any hint of moisture. This search is exhausting. Without adequate water, we cannot perform osmosis to draw essential nutrients from the soil into our cells. We are literally starving and parched, unable to transport the hydration and minerals up through our stems to the leaves and flowers that depend on us.
You can understand our plight by checking the environment you placed us in. Insert your finger into the soil near our base. If we are underwatered, the top 1-2 inches of our home will feel dry, dusty, and crumbly. It will pull away from the edges of the pot, creating a gap. This is a clear sign of drought stress. Conversely, if we are overwatered, the soil will feel constantly wet, cold, and soggy days after you last watered. It may even have a dense, heavy feel and a musty odor, indicating a lack of oxygen and the potential onset of root rot, which is a death sentence for us.
Our leaves are the most honest indicators of our health. When we are desperately thirsty from being underwatered, our leaves communicate our distress clearly. They will become limp, wilted, and droopy, feeling thin and papery to the touch. They lose their turgor pressure—the water pressure that keeps us firm. In severe cases, the edges will turn brown and crispy, and leaf drop may occur as we sacrifice foliage to conserve the little water we have for our core functions.
When you love us too much with water, our leaves tell a different story. They may also wilt and droop, but crucially, they will feel soft, mushy, and unusually heavy, not crisp and light. They often turn a pale green or yellow, particularly the older leaves lower down on the stems. This yellowing is a sign we are drowning and cannot access the nutrients needed to maintain our green chlorophyll.
Look beyond our leaves. Our stems also hold vital clues. Underwatering causes our stems to become brittle, weak, and may cause them to shrivel. We simply do not have the water content to keep them robust. Our flowering will cease abruptly, as producing blooms is an energy-intensive process we cannot afford without proper hydration. We will drop existing flower buds to conserve all resources for survival.
An overwatered impatiens plant exhibits stem problems of a more sinister nature. The stems, particularly at the base near the soil line, will become soft, mushy, and dark in color—often black or dark brown. This is a symptom of rot, a fungal condition that sets in when our roots are suffocating in waterlogged soil. Like with underwatering, we will also drop our buds and flowers, but this is due to systemic shock and decay rather than conservation.
Finally, the most definitive diagnosis happens beneath the surface, out of your sight. If you gently lift us from our pot, our roots will reveal the truth. Healthy roots are firm and white or tan. In an underwatered state, our roots will be dry, brittle, and may look shriveled. In a severely overwatered state, the horror is evident: our roots will be brown or black, slimy to the touch, and will easily fall apart. They emit a foul, rotten smell. This root rot is often irreversible, as it destroys our entire system for absorbing water and nutrients.
