4.24.2017

Propagating Succulents





It's almost May....I love May.  And not just because it's my Birthday month, but because the weather is perfect, the flowers are popping out all over and the breeze is sweetened with the sounds of summertime.  I have grown to appreciate nature more and more and I know this summer is going to be filled with long camp trips, nature walks and picnics of all kinds.  
Recently I have been propagating Succulents and loving my results.  I never knew that this was a thing, luckily I found out when I did, because my Succulents were out of control tall or what you would call a leggy plant.

So, here is what you do in a few easy steps if you want some sweet baby succulents yourself.  First you need to take off the bottom leaves of a leggy plant.  This is where your plant is growing tall.  Then the tops like this fella here you just pop back into the soil and it will continue growing.
When you take off the leaves you want to get as close to the stalk as possible and slightly twist back and forth.  You have to get the WHOLE leaf, don't snap or break it off.  Make sure to also use healthy leaves, not damaged or shriveled ones.  Look below to see how many leaves I had from about 3 plants.  And the cool thing about this is I still have the 3 plants and I'm about to have like 25 more.  Not bad!!!

Once you have them all I laid them out on top of soil in indirect light for about a week.  This helped the ends callous over.  Keep them there in the indirect sunlight, but every day give them a light spritzing of water.  Don't "wet" them a lot, just enough for the top soil to be moist.  You should see little pink or red roots and then little babies sprouting anywhere from 1 to 3 weeks. Aren't these honestly the sweetest thing you have ever seen?????



Around week 4 or so you can sprinkle a little dirt covering the new roots.  Sometimes I have to wait a little longer more like 5 weeks before I do this.  Soon after this step the "Mother" leaf will start to wither up and you can then carefully remove it.  And I have been able to reuse this same leaf and make 2 0r 3 more plants if it's a healthy leaf.
Take your new plant and put it in it's new pot to grow and be beautiful!!!  Once it's established it's roots well, a few weeks you can stop misting it daily and do a more adult succulent watering and give it direct sunlight from then on out.
So, what do you think?  It's such a fun way to get out in nature and get your hands all dirty.  Not to mention it's also pretty peaceful to tend and nurture these sweet little babies.  Let me know if you give it a try with your succulents at home.

No comments:

Post a Comment