Taking an active, healthy leaf from a mature succulent plant and utilizing it to establish a new plant is known as “propagating with leaf cuttings.” Because the leaves of succulents with fleshy, plump leaves, like echeveria, are simple to snap off cleanly, this method of propagation works well with them.
While some leaves may simply pop off with a little tug, others could necessitate the use of a sharp knife. Take a healthy leaf from the plant’s base with clean hands or a sterile knife, making sure to remove the full, undamaged leaf.
After being removed, allow the leaf to recover for about four days in a warm, well-lit place so that the wound can callus over. When the leaf has calloused, prepare a fresh planter with soil, fill it with water, and set the callused leaf on top of the soil for multiplication.
When the earth is dry, spritz your leaves with a spray bottle. Keep them warm, in a room with lots of light, but out of direct sunlight. They must be kept warm and moist.
Little roots and leaves will start to emerge after around three weeks! A succulent may need a few months to grow large enough to be replanted (photos above are after about 8 weeks). When the leaf eventually gets brown and falls off, you’ll know it’s time. This indicates that the succulent no longer requires the leaf because it has consumed all of its nutrients.
When should I plant my succulents that I’ve propagated?
Succulents can also grow from solitary leaves. Succulent cultivars with fleshy, plump leaves that are simple to remove function well with this technique. Leaf propagation spares less of the “mother” plant and each leaf can create numerous little plants, even though it will take much longer to produce a full-sized plant. Getting a quality leaf cutting is crucial, much like with stem cuttings. Although they must split from the plant at the base of the stem, leaves can be wiggled off of a plant. Kremblas advises caution, saying, “Be sure to reach all the way down to where the leaf joins the stem, as a broken leaf will not propagate.” And make sure to select a leaf that is firm, plump, and limp-free.
Leaf cuttings should be allowed to callus and need partial sun to grow, just like stem cuttings. Leaf cuttings should be placed on top of a thin layer of succulent potting soil (not buried), and they should be misted with water to keep them wet. The leaf cuttings will start to grow little “pup” plants in about three weeks. The mother leaves will start to wilt and drop off after eight weeks, at which point your pups are ready to be planted.
How are rooted succulent leaves planted?
Succulents can be propagated in water, but doing so goes against the ideal growing circumstances for these plants. Start your leaves and cuttings in shallow planting trays or tiny containers packed with potting soil for the best outcomes. Succulents can be grown in individual containers without having to transplant them right away.
Follow these easy steps once planting day arrives and your leaf or stem cuttings have callused:
1. Get your planting trays or containers ready. Use a coarse, quick-draining potting mix made for succulents and cacti and gently moisten it. 2 Make planting holes with a little stick.
2. Add a little RootBoost Rooting Hormone to a serving dish. When pouring, only utilize what you’ll need and discard the remainder.
3. Cut one piece at a time. Wet the cutting stem or leaf base before dipping it into the dish of rooting hormone. Completely round the stem or leaf base. Get rid of any extra rooting powder by shaking.
4. Carefully tuck leaves or stems into the rooting powder so it doesn’t fall out. The potting mix should then be carefully pressed around the cuttings.
- Insert the base at an angle just below the soil line to accommodate leaves. Put curled leaves in an upwards-curving position. (On that side, the new tiny plant grows.)
- Insert the bottom half of the stem into the potting mix so that it covers at least two bare nodes when taking stem cuttings.
5. Wait until roots start to form before watering. Once the dirt has dried, give it a good watering before repeating the process. The majority of succulent leaf and stem cuttings should root in two to three weeks, while rooting times might vary greatly. The fastest-rooting cuttings are those from stem tips.
6. After the roots have taken hold, transplant your new succulents from trays to tiny containers. Use the same kind of potting soil as you did previously. Be careful not to disrupt young, delicate roots.
Gather Your Succulents To Plant
For this video, we’ll be planting a variety of succulent species using both cuttings and discarded leaves. Amass the materials you want to plant. You can either utilize fallen leaves or cut cuttings from an established plant. If you can’t locate cuttings anywhere else, you can usually find them online and at most florists. Although these are also available on Amazon, I got mine from a vendor on Etsy.
Prepare your succulents for planting.
The most crucial step in this method is preparing your succulents. Make sure you have enough stem to plant in the ground so it can support the plant. Any excess leaves at the stem’s base should be removed. It’s good to leave approximately an inch of the stem exposed for larger cuttings, and you can use less for smaller cuttings.
After that, examine the base of your cutting. The plants ought to have a “callous” on them, which denotes that the plant’s base has dried out. You should wait a few days before planting freshly cut succulents because this forms a few days after the succulent is cut. By letting the cut end dry more quickly on a paper towel or paper bag, you can hasten this process.
Succulents are wonderful because you can also plant their leaves, so hold onto the ones you pulled off the stem. Verify your succulents for any bad components. Any area of the plant that is dark contains rot, which can spread to other areas and ultimately destroy the plant. Simply cutting it will allow you to get rid of the rotten parts.
Mix your soil.
If you aren’t using a pre-made succulent soil mix, you’ll need to prepare your soil so that it will drain effectively and support the growth of your succulent plants. To make the soil drain well, I combine one part potting soil with one part sand. In order to help larger plants become more firmly rooted in the ground, I also prefer to have a supply of tiny rocks nearby.
To fill a pot or tray, pour your soil mixture. I’m repurposing an old baking pan that I can’t bake in as a planting tray.
Plant!
We’ve reached the enjoyable part now! Make a little, inch-deep hole in the ground. After inserting your cutting, fill up the depression with soil.
Make careful to space your cuttings, if you’re planting more than one, roughly 2-3″ apart.
Ensure that your plants receive adequate water. Although succulents don’t often require much water, you may need to water them every 2-4 days while they are developing their roots, depending on how dry the soil becomes. It’s normal for the leaves to initially appear a little dried out because the plant is using its reserves of stored energy to develop new roots. New growth should begin to appear in around four weeks. Change to weekly watering or watering only when the soil is dry once the plants have set their roots and have started to grow.
Admire and Show Off Your Work!
Well done! Show off your incredible craftsmanship and green thumb to all of your friends! These plants will be prepared for repotting if you desire once they have developed roots and begun to grow, which should take around 3 to 6 weeks. They make wonderful Christmas gifts for friends and coworkers when planted in a tiny Mason jar or vibrant pot!
Do you water leaves from propagating succulents?
Hello everyone, this video is about watering your succulent propagations and is from Andrea at Sucs for You in Houston, Texas.
I asked for your questions on watering succulent propagations in a post on the Sucs for You YouTube channel’s community page; perhaps you saw it. There were a lot of excellent questions, and I appreciate all of the comments. Please subscribe if you haven’t already so you can notice when I post a request for video ideas and leave questions there as well.
You can learn when and how to water succulents from this video, regardless of whether you’re growing them from leaves, cuttings, or offsets. The main focus of this article is on watering your propagations, but we’ll also go over a few other crucial suggestions.
However, before anything else, we need to quickly discuss callusing since no matter what, no water of any kind should ever be added to a propagation that hasn’t entirely callused.
And the reason for this is that if water gets into an open wound, rot could start to develop if there are any unpleasant germs in the soil around it, which there probably are.
And just as there is no way to predict how long a flesh wound would take to totally scab over, there is no single answer for how long your propagations will take to callus.
Naturally, larger cuts will take longer to heal, and humid climates typically require longer than dry ones.
When the area where the propagation, whether a leaf, stem cutting, or offset, was removed shows no trace of wetness or new growth, it has healed.
Now that that has been established, you can begin your leaf propagations on a soilless media, such as a paper tray or windowsill, but you must eventually introduce soil to them.
And I wanted to point you that, in order to prevent the propagations from drying out before they send out roots, gardeners in drier locations might need to start their callused leaves on moderately damp soil. I’ve heard a lot of stories of that happening.
However, avoid drowning the soil and direct moisture away from the plant. Just enough moisture will do to provide the plant some humidity and aid in the development of new roots.
As long as the propagations are not in direct sunlight, humid areas won’t need to worry about this as much.
When it comes to leaf propagation, the leaves themselves should be maintained as dry as possible, which means no misting, and they shouldn’t be watered until they begin to put out roots.
Keep in mind that even though they lack roots, plants are still living, developing, and even breathing thanks to their stomata, the pores that cover leaves and allow gasses and water to travel in and out. Standing water on leaves can also promote rot.
If you have difficulties keeping the roots from drying out, you can arrange the leaf so the roots are simpler to bury. Alternatively, you can wait for the roots to find the soil and direct a tiny amount of water directly at them.
It should only require a few light waterings spread out throughout the course of the week. In order to avoid “spoiling” the propagations with too much water, let the soil dry out for at least a day between waterings. If you don’t, they might slow down the growth of their roots.
The amount of time it takes for them to develop new roots or leaves is unpredictable. How long till this little leaf does anything? is a question I hear frequently.
The plant’s type, climate, and natural growing seasons all have a role in this. It’s interesting how quickly some have put out roots for me—as little as a week—while others have taken their sweet time—well over a month, possibly even two months. However, there is still a potential that the leaf will spread as long as it is sound and well-hydrated.
Now, if you notice a lot of root growth but no leaf growth (I hear about it a lot), hydrate the soil around them more and gradually expose them to more light.
And if you’ve been moistening the soil but are seeing new leaves growing but few to no roots, consider reducing the amount of hydration.
I had some Echeveria Hercules leaves that were about two weeks old. Some were transferred to a large pot filled with dirt, along with other rooted plants, and I watered them without touching the leaves. I didn’t water the other batch at all, and they were kept in a tray with nothing but drainage materials.
While plants in the tray had far more roots than leaves, those in the soil produced many more roots than foliage.
This made me think that the leaves in the soil could sense or “smell” the water nearby and didn’t feel as pressured to put out roots, focusing instead on developing new leaves, whilst the leaves in the tray did the opposite.
One of two things will follow, depending on how well the propagation went. The mother leaf may even maintain sufficient moisture to remain attached to the new plant after drying out and the baby leaf spontaneously separates.
The new plant needs to be cared after like a newborn. To keep the roots happy, it can require more frequent watering; nevertheless, you must be careful not to overpot it. Use a smaller pot and make sure the soil mix contains sufficient of drainage components to avoid overpotting, which occurs when a plant is in a pot with too much soil for it to dry out quickly enough.
In most circumstances, it’s advisable to wait for roots to form before adding moisture, unless you’re in an arid region, and cuttings need to be fully callused before introducing any water, just like with leaf propagations.
In order to detect when a cutting is fully callused without having to dig it up and perhaps harm any delicate new roots, I prefer to “air” pot my cuttings. This merely indicates that I will either place the cuttings in an empty pot or in a container that is only partially filled with drainage materials.
Since they are still developing, we need to keep them standing erect because if they are lying down, they will begin to bend and sit up like tiny plant zombies in quest of light.
You can pot your cuttings in dry soil once they are calloused and ideally starting to sprout roots. I water roughly three times each month after waiting a few days to give the roots time to adjust to being in soil.
After 5 days, the soil will likely be nearly dry depending on the pot, and I want it to be dry until I water it again to stimulate the roots to seek out moisture.
You should keep an eye out for fresh top growth on your cuttings to see whether new roots are also sprouting. You can gently tug on the plant after about a month to check for resistance coming from the new root growth. Wait until the soil is completely dry before checking for roots because otherwise they could break and infections in wet soil could penetrate more easily. And we all understand that’s bad.
The offset, or pup, must be handled as a cutting if it doesn’t yet have its own root system. Additionally, even if it has its own roots, as with Aloes and Haworthias, you still need to wait for any broken roots to heal before adding any water.
To easily keep an eye out for any infections or other issues, I like to leave offsets unpotted for a few days. And after I plant them up, I continue to wait a few days before watering them. Once more, it is important to give any broken roots time to heal. I also believe that before watering, the plants would benefit from some time to grow used to being buried in dirt.
Start out with less regular waterings until the root system is more robust, just like with the other ways of propagation, and watch out for overpotting your offsets.
That’s it for this video; if you had any doubts regarding watering succulent propagations, it should have covered them. If not, I hope it will have greatly improved your chances of success.
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