I keep forgetting which one is read as はえる and which one as うえる。
Can anyone think of any good mnemonics to distinguish these two and keep the readings straight?
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Shot in the dark but here are two possible methods:
For 生える, which sounds like “hae” in “haeru”, think of hair growing. Hair grows naturally, just like plants that sprout or grow by themselves.
For 植える, imagine you are “planting” a seed with your hands (“u” for “you”). When you plant something, you are actively putting it in the ground.
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You should read うえきの法則, or just know about it, I guess.
His name is 植木耕助 and he makes plants from trash.
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This may help with remembering 植える Confusing Mnemonics and Leeches Help Thread - #41 by AlexR1der
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I think of 草生える（くさはえる）, internet slang for laughing, similar to LOL.
in the chat people type “wwww”
“w” stands for 笑(“wara”), laughing.
Many consecutive “w” look like blades of grass. So “the grass is growing” in the chat because everyone is laughing.
Every one is laughing: ha ha ha. HA-eru （はえる）
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Not a mnemonic but as you can see in this animal crossing new horizons screenshot you encounter 植える a lot, and probably in similar games where you have to cultivate stuff, so at your level if you have time for it picking up a game that deals with this kind of life chores (or what ever you call it…) will give you some good exposure to a lot of vocabulary you learn with a more meaningful real context (like gardening, farming and such) and that way you would stop confusing those two. You just need to confidently know one of them in order to stop mixing ‘em up and then you’ll get the other by elimination (since to plant is 植える 生える is the one with the は).
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I’ve only finished Genki 1 at this point, do you think that would be enough to understand something like animal crossing or should I wait until I’ve finished Genki 2?
I did finish Genki I probably more on the shallow side though, but I can tell you that understanding some things is the correct description. If you’re willing to take your time and translate what you don’t understand, which is what I am doing, it will give you a massive push forward, but it is a project. It really depends on your goal, though. If you want to be able to read more comfortably then finishing Genki II would probably make it easier.
There are instances where I easily understand and there are ones where it requires translating and looking for grammar points I’m not familiar with. It’s a choice.
Personally I find the way ACNH uses hiragana, katakana and kanji interchangeably/sporadically really rewarding - managing to discern which kanji combination is the correct one for some random hiragana string in a sentence when I’ve never seen that kanji before and don’t know the word but have enough basic knowledge to recognize some of the radicals and it’s not even the first suggestion I’m given then finding out from the context that this was the right choice - extremely rewarding.
However if you’re looking for casual gaming with some reading - you’ll find yourself drowning in text heavy interactions with tons of keigo at the beginning and lots of character embellishment all over the sentences… And this game is text heavy until it’s not, but it takes a very long time to get to the point where the interaction becomes repetitive to a fault.
I really enjoy encountering words that otherwise would have become leeches an hour or two after learning them on WaniKani.
If you already have it, you can always try and see how you fare with it, what’s the worst that could happen? If you find it too tedious language wise you can always put it aside and go back to it after you finish some more chapters or the entire textbook.
What I can tell for sure - I am way more invested in the dialogue in ACNH than in any of the dialogues in the Genki series which bored me to tears, so this is also something to consider.
Not a straight forward answer, but I hope it paints a picture that gives you some clue.
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To add to durteloni’s message, both 生える and 植える were actually discussed further down the thread here as well: Confusing Mnemonics and Leeches Help Thread - #49 by AlexR1der
I had been mixing them both up as well. But I’ve remembered them well since getting a solution in this thread.
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Lol, same here 
This does not address your question, so it’s just a side comment - but I found that because there were more than enough WK levels between first learning 生える (level 6 https://www.wanikani.com/vocabulary/生える) and later learning 植える (level 12 https://www.wanikani.com/vocabulary/植える) that I never developed any confusion between the two.
Instead, the original obstacle that I faced was learning 生える to begin with, because with so many possible different readings of 生, keeping all of those straight was a challenge in its own right.
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