Fall is the reverse of spring — instead of easing plants into more light and faster growth, you’re easing them back down toward the slower, low-maintenance routine that gets them through winter. Do this gradually and in the right order and you avoid most of the problems that show up in winter: shocked plants, hitchhiking pests, and root systems sitting in soil that’s still wet from a summer watering schedule. Here’s the order to work through it in.

Bring outdoor plants back in before the first cold night

If you moved anything outside for the warm months, don’t wait for a cold snap to force the decision. Most tropical houseplants start showing stress well before frost — many are uncomfortable once nights drop into the 50s°F — so bring plants in while temperatures are still mild rather than rushing an emergency move later. Bringing plants in gradually, or at least on a mild day, also reduces the shock of the light and humidity change between outdoors and indoors.

Check for pests and pathogens before reintroducing them to your collection

This is the step people skip and regret. A summer outdoors is also a summer of exposure to soil pests, insect eggs, and fungal spores that were never a concern indoors. Before a plant that’s been outside goes back near the rest of your collection, inspect it closely — undersides of leaves, stem joints, and the soil surface are where you’ll spot early trouble. It’s also worth doing a preventive once-over even if you don’t see anything: hose down the foliage, check for anything hiding in drainage holes, and consider a quarantine period of a week or two before the plant sits next to others. Bringing in a single infested plant is how a small outdoor pest problem becomes an indoor infestation — see this guide to common houseplant pests for what to look for and how to treat anything you find.

Start tapering off fertilizer

Growth slows as daylight hours drop, and a plant that’s slowing down can’t use fertilizer the way it could in peak summer. Rather than stopping cold, taper it — cut the frequency or dilute the strength over a few weeks as you head into fall, and stop altogether once you’re not seeing new growth. Fertilizer applied to a plant that’s no longer actively growing tends to just accumulate as salt in the soil instead of getting used, which is more likely to cause harm than good heading into the season when the plant is least equipped to deal with it.

Cut back watering as light drops and growth slows

Less light means less photosynthesis, which means less water use, even before you’d notice any visible slowdown in growth. The most common fall mistake is sticking with a summer watering schedule into a season when the plant simply isn’t using water at that rate anymore, which leaves soil wet for far longer than it should be. Start checking soil moisture before each watering instead of watering by the calendar, and expect the gap between waterings to stretch out gradually over the next couple of months.

Check humidity as heaters start running

Once heating systems kick on for the season, indoor air dries out fast — often faster than people expect, since the effect isn’t obvious until leaf tips start browning. This hits humidity-loving plants like ferns and calatheas hardest, but it’s worth checking any plant that sits near a vent or radiator. Catching this early, before crispy edges show up, is easier than reversing the damage afterward.

Get any last repotting done before it’s too late

If a plant is root-bound or badly overdue for fresh soil, early-to-mid fall is your last reasonably safe window before winter dormancy sets in. Repotting disturbs roots, and a plant that’s about to slow way down for winter has a harder time recovering from that disturbance than one that’s actively growing. Once a plant is clearly dormant, hold off — repotting is much easier on a plant in spring when it’s ready to push new growth into the fresh soil, so anything not urgent can simply wait a few months.

Working through it in order

These steps build on each other: get outdoor plants in and checked for hitchhikers first, then start easing off fertilizer and watering as growth actually slows, and treat humidity and repotting as the last details before everything settles into its winter routine. Move at the pace your plants show you rather than a fixed date, and you’ll head into winter with a collection that’s already adjusted rather than one that gets caught off guard by the first cold week.