Jade and Aloe Plants

JADE AND ALOE PLANTS

During the down time between Christmas and when our store re-opens in early January there is still clean up work to do, but once that is finished I like to "tinker" in the greenhouse.  One of the things I usually do at this time is propagate my jade and aloe plants.  These are the parent plants below that were given to me by dad's brother Uncle George.

 

I only propagate about 15 of each because they're really not the best seller.  If they sell well then I can always do more.  I start with the jade plant and with a pair of sharp scissors or a knife cut off about 3 inches or so from anywhere on the plant.  I try to make the parent plant look balanced so I'll cut it wherever it looks like it needs a haircut.  Once I've separated it from the main plant I remove the bottom 3 or so set of leaves.  This is the part that will go in the soil to form roots.

 

  

Then all that's left to do is push it into the already moistened soil up to the point where I stopped removing the leaves.  That's it!  I've read that it helps to use some sort of rooting hormone on the part that goes in the soil but I have never done that and my jade plant offspring always grow without a problem.  

I like to use a 3.5" pot for growing my succulents.  It's the same type of pot that we grow herbs in later in the season.

Once I've planted all 15, I insert the plant tags with the description of the Jade plant and the scientific name Crassula Argentea.  I don't water them because, as I've already mentioned, the soil was semi-wet before I started and also because succulents store moisture in their leaves and don't need a particularly large amount of water.  In fact being too wet will actually damage them (as it will most plants).

These Jade plants make wonderful houseplants.  They are very slow growing but live for several years.

Now onto the Aloe plant.  This is a bit of a different procedure as I'm actually not cutting anything off of the parent plant because Aloe can self propagate.  In fact they are so good at it it's almost a nuisance.  I take the entire (very heavy) plant out of it's container and you will see all of the baby plants growing from bulbs that that the parent plant has already done all by itself. 

There is way more than the 15 plants here that I require, but I chose the ones that are not too big (for a 3.5" pot) and not too small.  On this particular Aloe plant I have to watch out because some of the leaves have become rotten.  This is due to being watered and getting the leaves wet.  They don't like that, especially in conditions where the water does not evaporate rapidly enough.  I either avoid those bulbs or carefully peel the leave off.

Once my 15 Aloe offspring have been selected, it's as easy as making a small hole in the soil with my fingers, inserting the new plant, and packing it in the soil.  Again, this is a succulent so the soil does not require any water at this time.  In fact I won't give these any water for a week and when I do it will be very little.

Now I simply wait for the Jade plants to root (takes several weeks) and the new Aloe plants will begin making their own offspring before you know it.

Thank you for reading my post about succulents.  Have a great day.