Hi Paul! It's in a Kritter Keeper, turned upside down, lol, and it's staying between 65-85% humidity. I'm still misting it twice a day, however. Now, I have another worry. The soil looks very heavy, and it's still moist, and I've had the plant for 5 days! I see no perlite in it at all. But . . .I'm terrified to repot it, as I know how delicate they are. I'm afraid I'll kill it. But I'm afraid it'll get root rot.

It's Calathea lancifolia, it'll take occasional drops in humidity but not consistently below about 20%. They unfortunately don't "get used to it". And you do need to do something with soil that stays too wet. By the time you notice damage in the leaves there'll be a lot more damage to the root system. They're not that delicate provided you don't expose them to too much heat, sun or drying of roots when repotting.

Hi Randi:

Pls help me understand why in hot, dry Calif you're buying tropical, moisture loving, high humidity needing plants which are known to be difficult in good conditions. The odds seem against this.

I myself in humid NYC, have given up trying Calathea, Maranta as I just can't meet their needs here.

Karen, LOL, I love the look of some of the Calatheas, and want so badly to grow them! I did have a Maranta for 4-5 years before it suddenly died on me. Even in this aridity! But I haven't had luck with them since. I'm going to change the media before the roots rot on my lancifolia, tropic, now that I know it's not as delicate as I feared. I'll be very careful.

If you go the terr route (which might be you best hope), some of the larger Exoterra terrs might do. (You might get lucky and find one on Craigslist ... I have a 24" x 18" and a 18" x 18" which I obtained that way.)

I'm keeping it in the Kritter Keeper by now. I did go ahead and change out its soil today to half perlite and half peat. The roots look good. It was easier than I thought (I feared it would be several cuttings that would all come apart). The roots were in a ball so I rinsed off all I could of the old media. It looks really good tonight (several hours post repot). I'll let you know if I have any trouble or a "shocky" plant tomorrow. Thanks all!

Randi, a desert climate isn't what you'd associate Calathea with, but if you're careful and watch humidity and heat you should be okay.

This is one of mine in the garden today, been there (along with others) for about 3 to 4 years. This morning's low temperature was 20.9C with RH 80%. This afternoon's maximum was 34.2C with RH 32% and windy. It does get a combination of drier and hotter than that but usually overnight the humidity goes up significantly. In our wet season humidity is mostly between 80% to 100% and of course the Calatheas love it then.