Когда я снова полила почву, орхидея выглядела лучше, а стебель стал крепче.

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Breakdown of Когда я снова полила почву, орхидея выглядела лучше, а стебель стал крепче.

• когда: when
• лучше: better
• снова: again

Questions & Answers about Когда я снова полила почву, орхидея выглядела лучше, а стебель стал крепче.

Why is it полила and not поливала?

Because полила is the perfective past form of полить. It presents the watering as a completed single action: when I watered the soil again.

Поливала would be the imperfective form and would sound more like:

• I was watering
• I used to water
• I watered repeatedly / as a process

In this sentence, the speaker is talking about one completed event that led to a result, so полила fits better.

Why does the verb end in -ла in полила and выглядела?

In the Russian past tense, singular verbs agree with the subject's gender.

So:

• masculine: полил, выглядел
• feminine: полила, выглядела
• neuter: полило, выглядело

Here:

• я полила suggests the speaker is female
• орхидея выглядела is feminine because орхидея is a feminine noun

If the speaker were male, he would say Когда я снова полил почву...

Why is почву used here, not почва?