is it a camera trick.. or is the media barely above halfway up the pot ...???

i did a reply that took me about 10 ins.. and firefox ate it.. oh well

ken

If you just acquired it, I would give it some time before making further adjustments.

It looks pretty good to me. I see some yellow leaves around the base. But nothing major.

There isn't a way for me to tell from the picture if it needs a repot. But I wouldn't further stress it just yet.

Do these pictures help more?

I’m no expert (just had to stick my adansonnii in water because it was overpotted and the roots began to rot) but that pot looks very small to house the stake and the root ball of what that size plant should be.

May be why the lower leaves are failing.

I’d go up 2” in pot size. Maybe even a bit more considering the stake.

On a scale from 1-10 with 10 being the peak of vitality, I'd guess your plant is somewhere near 4-5. Unfortunately, w/o some additional understanding re how you care for the plant, other than appearance, there are no clues that would allow reaching a meaningful conclusion about what changes might prove helpful.

How far is the plant from the nearest window, and what direction does the window face. Can light pass through the window and reach the plant, unhindered by window treatments (drapes/ curtains/ blinds) and are any window treatments open every day throughout the daylight hours? What type of grow medium is the plant in? Does it appear to be made entirely of fine particles? What have you been doing about fertilizing regularly? what using? how often? what are the fertilizer's NPK %s? Does the plant get watered in place or at the sink? Does your home have an ionic exchange water softening system (uses salt)? When you water, do you make sure the entire soil column is saturated and enough excess water is applied to flush the soil of accumulating dissolved solids (salts). Is the plant allowed to sit in the effluent that exits the drain hole when you water?

This Overview of Good Growing Practices should provide some guidance, and will allow you to compare what you are doing insofar as care to what is suggested. Sometimes, problems end up belonging under the heading of 'idiopathic'. When that occurs, the best course is to go back to the basics, adjusting current practices and starting afresh, with an eye toward making sure all cultural conditions are at least close to being in what would be considered the plant's sweet spot.

Al

Thank you for the feedback. Please be patient with me. I'm a newbie. :-) My neighbor came over to help me. Here are some pictures. I think she addressed most of you all's feedback, but please let me know if more is needed. I really like this plant! I just got this plant less than two weeks ago.

My neighbor said that the plant needed to be repotted immediately, and this is what she did. I also included the potting soil she used which she says works well with both indoor and outdoor. She used 75% of her potting mix and 25% of the pummis mix, which she said will be a good soil for this type of plant. She heavily watered it and let it drain. When she removed the plant from the old pot, all the roots around coiled around the bottom of the pot, some larger rooted were wrapped around 2-3 times around the bottom. She aggressively kinda unraveled the roots and unclunked the soil and promised me she wasn't damaging the roots. It look to me like some of the smaller roots were pulled off but she said the root needed to be reinvigorated and will be fine. Anyway, she went up two sized with the pot size instead of one because that was the only pot she had and she mentioned it would be fine going up two pot sizes instead of one size.

She recommends that I hang the plant in my dining room or living room (east facing unobstructed windows- about 5 feet from window), which would provide moderate light from morning sun. I fertilized the plant when I acquired it. I used the fertilizer in the picture below.

She also recommended a humidifier near the plant, which I already have. I really want the plant to "climb" so she said she repotted in a way where I can easily add a stake if I want to. She mentioned that the stake I had was too large the plant leaves so I need to find another stake. Does anyone have a recommendation for where and what kind of stake I can purchase that would be best for this plant. I want to put it on the ground and let it climb. And how tall should the stake be?

Any other recommendations? Am I wrong for wanting the plant to be a "climber?" I see how beautiful it looks when it climbs up a pole. Does anyone have any advice on setting that up. My neighbor is really a fan of stakes because all her plants hang all over the place at her home.

I hope I am making sense. Thanks in advance.