A large terrarium can be a beautiful and interactive fixture for your indoor space. With one, you’re not just limited to adding greenery and little bursts of color to your home - keeping and caring for plants is a beloved pastime that may even bring health benefits with it and improve your quality of life.
Plus, when set up and cared for properly, a closed terrarium will recycle its own water. Pair up a glass terrarium with well-chosen plants and you will be able to enjoy fresh greenery and the brightness of plant life with minimal care and attention. You can see for yourself just how easy it is to set up and care for your terrarium right here on our website. Just visit our pages on Planting Your Terrarium and Terrarium Maintenance.
If that sounds appealing to you, check out some of these plants which, when given the proper care, should thrive in your large terrarium.
1.Mosses
Mosses are a great choice for anyone who is starting out with a terrarium and doesn’t have a lot of experience. There are many species - thousands - of mosses, and most if not all of them are tolerant of cool temperatures and low light conditions. They’re also slow-growing, which is preferable in a terrarium, and many of them thrive in humid environments, which a closed terrarium will provide.
2.Baby Tears
Have you ever seen those bright, lush green plants that make what looks like a soft carpet along the ground of a terrarium? It looks like duckweed but it grows on land instead of the water - that plant is baby tears.
These plants love humidity, which means they will not only do well in a terrarium but usually very well alongside mosses. They’re also good for filling in the empty spaces along the bottom of a terrarium, kind of like ground cover.
3.Ferns
Like mosses, there are thousands of species of ferns. Some of these grow to sizes larger than a human, but many of them are small enough to be kept indoors in a terrarium. Like the other plants mentioned above, some ferns thrive in the shade and many of them do well with high-humidity conditions as well.
The other thing is they can be paired with baby tears or mosses in your terrarium as they grow vertically and will reach above the cover produced by these other plants.
4.Pothos
Pothos is a common houseplant because it is easy to care for and has attractive, bright green foliage, similar in color to the baby tears mentioned above.
They grow much more vigorously than the other plants mentioned above, so extra care will need to be taken to grow them in a terrarium. However, they tolerate shade, love extra humidity, and don’t require a lot of fertilizer.
Just make sure you prune them as you don’t want your terrarium to be overcrowded, and you want to avoid letting plants touch the glass if you can help it.
5.Spider Plants
Spider plants, like Pothos plants, also tolerate shade and love moisture and humidity. Also, like Pothos plants, they grow larger than some of the other plants mentioned above and can outstrip their enclosure.
However - spider plants also produce little shoots that will take root when you bury the base of them. The little scions are much smaller than the rootstock adults and will readily adapt to a smaller environment, making these ideal for your large terrarium .
6.Carnivorous Plants
There are also many carnivorous plants like Sundew Plants and Venus Fly Traps that can thrive in a terrarium. You’ll need to provide extra care for these, but given their very nature, they are adept at thriving in cool, damp, nutrient-poor environments.
They won’t require much light or any fertilizer; in fact, you can leave the door of your terrarium open periodically and if there are any bugs about these plants may even lure them in and make a meal of them.
7.Succulents and Cacti
Succulents and cacti will also flourish in a terrarium, provided you take note of a few key points. Unlike the other plants on this list, these plants are sensitive to humidity and will not do well if they are in a wet environment all of the time.
Therefore, they’re best for open terrariums. If you want one of our closed glass terrariums, just make sure you add significantly less water to the set up and air it out periodically to prevent mold growth. They also do well together (cacti and succulents) but not particularly well with the other plants on this list.
Remember, these are only some of the plants that will likely do very well in your large terrarium - but you don’t even need to populate a terrarium with plants! Check out our blog on Terrarium Design Ideas to get inspired!
After you’ve gotten started planning, visit our collection of terrariums for sale and pick out a model that you believe will work best with your interior design scheme - and if you have questions about our products, call us at 208-640-4206.