Nearly killed my whole fern shelf with a $4 'miracle' spray from a garage sale in Mesa
Saw a guy selling a big jug of homemade leaf shine at a garage sale in Mesa last month for $4, and he swore his grandma used it on her ferns for 40 years. I sprayed my whole shelf of 11 ferns with it that night, woke up to leaves that looked wet and greasy, and by day three six of them had brown crispy edges curling in. Turns out the stuff was mostly mineral oil, which clogs the tiny pores on fern fronds so they can't breathe or take in water. I rinsed everything with plain lukewarm water in the shower for 8 minutes, cut off the dead fronds, and four of the six are pushing out new fiddleheads now. Has anyone else run into a homemade plant spray that backfired like this, and did your ferns pull through?