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My Avocado plant's leaves are all turning brown from the tips and a good amount has fallen off. The browning has been progressing throughout the winter (and maybe also before that). I usually water it when the soil is (almost) completely dry, but the dirt is a few years old and quite compacted now (is that bad?). Some new (and fully green) leaves have formed in the last few weeks (the sun is shining more now). I also fertilised it with a more or less appropriate long-term fertiliser about two months ago. As you can see, it lives inside and in a probably too small pot, but it's about 2m tall now.

What caused this? What can I do to prevent the new leaves from turning brown too?

leaves are brown on the plant partially brown leaves that fell off

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douira
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    you've answered your own question by the sound of it - the pot's too small. A plant is only ever as good as its root system, so pot into something larger using new potting soil. Add another photo showing the whole plant and its pot please in case that's not the issue – Bamboo May 23 '18 at 22:38
  • The pot _is_ actually pretty small. So I guess I need a bigger one. What kind of soil/pot environment do you recommend? The plant barely fits into the room (pretty high now); will it grow even higher if I give it a new pot? I read that the brown leaves are sometimes also caused by salt accumulation; is that resolved by a bigger pot? – douira May 24 '18 at 12:35
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    Hmm,well there's a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation about 'salts' on the web. If you live in a hardwater area, you will get limescale build up round the top of the soil, and sometimes on the soil itself. Where you live, I certainly wouldn't worry about 'salt' in your water... You may need to cut your plant back if it is badly defoliated to force new growth lower down, but use new sterilized potting soil in your clean, bigger pot. Using a too small pot means your plant is more likely to get tall, yet have leaf fall and leaf problems. – Bamboo May 24 '18 at 16:42
  • On the subject of 'salt' build up https://www.gardenmyths.com/tag/salts/ – Bamboo May 24 '18 at 16:47
  • Ok, so that is interesting; that other source I got the "salt" info from was uninformed then. So I'll probably try to use rainwater collected from the roof because that has less lime. – douira May 24 '18 at 20:22

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