Transplanting water before or after?

[Low Altitude]

Hello Everyone.

Generally, is there any advantage to transplanting (house-) plants either just after watering, or just before they are to be watered so the soil is at its dryest, or somewhere in between, or do we think it makes no difference?

I can see it both / all ways: dry soil shakes off roots more easily, so the root 'ball' is likely to be more manageable; onm the other hand, a moister, bigger, more coherent soil/root ball might offer more protection to roots, especially more fragile ones, and mean that the plant doesn't have to re-settle into new soil as radically. And maybe somewhere in the middle is the better of both worlds.

Any experience? Thanks.

 

[Meadowlark]

I've transplanted thousands of veggie plants...and have learned to ALWAYS water them right before transplanting and immediately after transplanting.

 

[Low Altitude]

BOTH! The voice of experience...!

Excellent, thanks.

 

[cpp gardener]

For houseplants I find it best for them to be somewhere between wet and needing to be watered. Not so dry as to fall apart but dry enough that a thorough soaking won't lead to over-moistness that leads to rot.

 

[Low Altitude]

That makes perfect sense, thanks. In this instance, thinking specifically about the time when a plant is being transplanted, so its roots are being handled and vulnerable, I was wondering less about rot – more a 'routine' issue – than about whether, for example, individual roots are more or less likely to break when either fully turgid (shortly after watering) or less turgid (ambient soil having dried slightly).

An old friend once told me wryly, "I don't think over-watering is your problem". But i think I killed a treasured azalea that way once. Root rot. Couldn't really have been anything else...

 

[cpp gardener]

There are fungi that attack the roots and can kill plants, but most "root rot" is more root drowning than anything else. Plant roots need air as well as water and if the soil is saturated for too long they will literally drown. Then opportunistic fungi invade and decompose the dead and dieing roots.