Fertilizer salt build-up
Brown tips plus heavy feeding and a crusty soil surface usually mean salt build-up burning the roots.
Diagnosis
Fertilizer salt build-up
What's happening
Bird of Paradise is sensitive to mineral salts. When excess fertilizer — or hard tap water — accumulates faster than it flushes out, the salts concentrate in the soil and chemically burn the fine root tips. That damage shows up as browning leaf tips and edges along with a white or yellow crust on the soil surface.
How to fix it
Flush the pot: run plenty of plain, room-temperature water through the soil until it drains freely from the bottom, and repeat several times to wash the salts out. Then cut back to feeding at half strength every 3–4 weeks during the growing season only, and consider using filtered or rainwater if your tap water is very hard.
What fixes it
- A long-spout watering can — A long-spout can makes it easy to flush the soil slowly and thoroughly to rinse the salts out.
If that doesn't fix it
This is general guidance based on common symptoms; individual plants vary.
Read the full Bird of Paradise care guide →
Reviewed June 2026 · how we check this