Propogating Plantlets En Mass

It's been AWHILE since my last entry, for the purely simple reason that my gardening time has been taken up by my non-succulent plants! I think I will cave and post all gardening stuff up here. I'm just doing too well with the dahlias!

This photo spread is a look at the "nursery" I set up in my mini-greenhouse. Some of the plants are cuttings, some are plants developing from dropped leaves, and some are just little plants, like my baby butterfly kalanchoes that grew on the leftovers from my deadheading of the pink plants.

Wanted to show the spray bottle, because I've found it's by far the BEST way to water plantlets and small cuttings. I got the spray bottle at Daiso Japan, my favorite "dollar" store (most items are actually $1.50). I set it to mist and then I mist the hell out of the plants. I want it looking like a Stephen King flick, at least for a millisecond. I'm done when everybody's all shiny and the soil is dark.

Most of these little guys are what I call "self-starters" or "accidental" propagation. Once a month, or just when I'm weeding, I look for dropped leaves that have started to grow into plants. Some succulents are so delicate the leaves just drop off when you brush them, so it's careful work to reach in and pick out the leaf with its plantlet and pink roots. I gotta be totally honest. I was at my parents' this weekend. I went through some of my mom's pots and stole her self-starters! Only five... besides, she container-gardens. No room for the plants to expand. I'm giving them life! Wink, wink. Emoji needed here.

If you take a look at this particular photo, you'll see that to the far right and center left are TWO BABY BUTTERFLY KALANCHOE PLANTS! These guys came from the leftover stems I had stuck in the dirt! They grew without leaves, so I popped them off their stems and after giving them a day or so to callous, set them in this wet, enriched soil. Weird thing; I've got three of the baby butterflies in here right now, and only the smallest one has developed roots at this point.

The aeonium above is the popular canariense variety, and is the last of about five cuttings I took the last time I "reorganized" that plot of plants. The other cuttings grew roots splendidly and have been popped in the ground with the rest of the succulent patch. Amazing to think they were cut off of plants that I bought originally at the size of the tiny cutting!

Sometimes you get strange growth. At the bottom center of the photo is a fuzzy little guy from my OTHER awesome kalanchoe, the fang plant. It's grown roots, but it doesn't seem to be developing a plant. It happens. Since it already has roots, I'm giving it a chance to turn into a "real" plant. This photo mostly contains ghost plant, jelly bean, and Fred Ives.

The Fred Ives plant has blown my mind. I bought one plant three years ago, and now I have at least ten fully-grown offshoot plants! An example of it is the orange-green rosette looking sideways at the center right. Fred Ives are one of those rainbow varieties, and while they aren't my FAVORITE, they are great to keep putting around the patch! Their plantlets grow REALLY weird, and always look wavy and wrong when tiny. I have two in my doll head pots right now. The other doll head has a ghost plant baby.

My original Fred Ives echeveria.

Here is a lovely ghost plant picture from the queen of succulents, Debra Lee Baldwin. Just look at those colors! Very excited about all my little ones!

Closing the Circle (no, this is not a Wiccan thing)

Aeonium rosettes cut cleanly from the mother plant.

This morning I did a little plant trimming and moving to complete the circle of aeoniums around my agave marginita. I started by cutting aeonium rosettes, then found that I had a smaller plant I could pull out and replant, as well as a rosette that had rooted.

This plant could be pulled out of the circle without leaving a large gap.

This little guy had already formed its own roots, so was a perfect choice.

In the larger plant I pulled, you can see how the long, brown stem would stand out as rather ugly in less dense foliage. This is a reason to deadhead a plant, and you would cut the stem off cleanly as closely to the "head" as possible.

Closing the gap. You can see I left some space for the agave where I had trimmed off leaves.

 I dug holes and planted the two rooted plants in the gap where the Mexican feather grass bush had been. They nearly enclose the space as is, but in less than a year will be dense enough with new growth to complete an entire circle around the agave.

Planted and watered.

After I planted the rooted plants, I got lazy. Because the aeoniums grow so prolifically, I wasn't too worried about coddling the two cuttings I had made. I set them in place lightly on top of the soil after I watered it for the rooted plants. Hopefully, without too much intervention from me, they will naturally callus and create a root system for themselves. It's worked before; these aeoniums are tough suckers!

Cuttings placed lightly balanced on the other plants so they won't touch soil directly.

The small plant in front/in back of the agave and aeoniums needs me to do some research on it (it was a gift), but I'm hoping it will be a small tree.

Agave Marginita - Time for a Trim

Ah, the agave. Favorite plant of city landscapers, likely due to the fact that it's nearly impossible to kill, will always make MORE agave to keep it company, and is so dangerous it keeps those ruffians off the street medians and freeway landscapes. The preferred agave is the Weber's Blue Agave which is the same agave used to make tequila, yay! However, the plant grows to be HUGE, boo! When it came time to get rid of my blue agave, the plant weighed about 175 pounds, and it wasn't nearly full grown. I couldn't do anything other than trim off the blade-like leaves to make it easier for the MEN to haul it out of the ground.

Weber's Blue Agave or agave tequilana at about 4-5 years old

There are nicer agaves to grow. One of two types of agaves I have held onto is the agave marginita. This agave is variegated with stripes of bluish-green, yellow, and white. It has some advantages over the agave tequilana:

• The marginita does not send out long rhizomes, and nearly all "pups" (or baby plants) will grow right at its base.
• It puts out very few pups, where an agave tequilana puts out dozens constantly (I rudely referred to mine as a slut)
• It is smaller than the agave tequilana, and can be planted in tighter quarters.
• It's more colorful than Weber's Blue
• It doesn't form a huge body filled with liquid-heavy, tequila-production friendly pulp

Agave marginita in late 2013

My own agave marginita was purchased by my brother in the autumn of 2013. It was very small, perhaps 8" tall at the most. As it grew, it produced very few pups, and when I redesigned by garden, I was able to dig it out, move it, and replant it myself without the help of extra muscle. I'm going to guess that when it did that in 2015 it weighed about thirty pounds, max.

Agave marginita in the summer of 2015

I decided to make it a focal piece in the new design, surrounding it with aeoniums. At least, it WOULD be surrounded by the aeoniums, once they bred a bit more and I separated and spread them out. The plant had grown into a lovely, wavy thing that reminded me of undersea kelp, and since I was going for the tidal pool look (a VERY popular succulent-garden design) the plant was perfect.

Nearly a year later and some things had changed. The aeoniums quickly grew and filled in the space around the plant with the exception of where the large Mexican feather grass bush grew. The agave itself grew in and on top of the aeoniums, and I decided that now was the time to trim it. The feather grass bush had given me MANY offspring bushes, and I pulled the original plant (which a neighborhood cat had decided to make into a toilet). This left a C-shape of aeoniums around the agave with some clear soil room for me to do some trimming.

Pups are growing, a tiny one on the right and a couple of larger ones on the left.

There were two tasks to be completed when it came to trimming the plant. First, I had to remove crowded, older leaves that had grown too close to the other plants and the soil. Next, I had to remove any pups that were growing off the mother plant. The feather grass bush had been so large it left a very nice-sized opening for me to work with.

My preferred blade for agave trimming.

To do this trimming, you will want a very sharp knife with a long blade, at least three to four inches. A box-cutter will not be long enough and you'll have to make slice after slice and saw through the leaf, which is about 3 inches thick at the base. A sharp blade will slice cleanly through, while a dull blade will get caught on the extremely tough fibrous tissue the plant is made of. Keep in mind that you are working among other large leaves, all of which have thorns on their edges, so you want a took that works well, fast, and requires the least amount of movement on your part!

 When I had finished, there were about 8-10 cut leaves and four pup plants that had been cut off. Most of the pups were not viable as individual plants because I had carelessly sliced through them without getting some of the rhizome/root.

After trimming. Those aeoniums really filled in!

 I could have trimmed off more leaves, but I like the plants to look full. In another year I'll have to trim around the plant again, removing those leaves closest to the ground, by which time it will have produced new ones from the center to take their place. At this point, I'm going to be separating, rooting and planting the aeoniums in order to complete a full circle around the agave.

Viable pup has roots growing separately from the slashed-through rhizome.

There was one viable pup that I decided to keep alive. I really do love how this plant looks. My father helped me remove the largest of the blue agave's offspring, and I put this little guy in its place. The patch at the top of my drive is the LAST part of the garden to be gotten in order, and I've decided to do succulents there as well.

The removed agave tequilana is probably about two years old.

Aw, it looks just like its mother plant did when we planted her!

Deadheading: It's Not As Bad As It Sounds

There comes a time in most succulent's lives where you're going to have to cut off their heads. Don't worry, it sounds a lot worse than it really is.

Grew under some portulaca, was reaching for the sun.

Most succulent plants look best without long stems. However, most succulents will grow extremely long stems the longer they are alive, which can look awkward. There are also conditions a plant may grow in which cause it to stretch when it should be dish-shaped, and dead-heading is great for these plants, too.

I used a dead stem to prop up the plant heads so they'll grow straight.

Today, I finally cut off the heads of my pink butterfly kalanchoes. This plant, which originally was one, is now three (I gave one to my mother), and the two remaining had stems nearly two feet long. The stems reached horizontally along the ground so the plants could get into the bright sunshine. Not very attractive, so, I cut them off.

The bottom of the stem is close to, but not touching the soil.

You want to use a very sharp knife, preferably as clean as possible. Once you've beheaded your plant, place it in a pot hovering JUST ABOVE some moist soil. This encourages the plant to grow roots to reach that soil. With this plant, the long "leaves" provide a prop to keep the stem from touching.

It usually takes a few weeks for the plant to grow new roots. Yes, you can just cut some heads off and stick them in the ground, but they won't necessarily root that way, and they may rot. For plants you really love, take it slow.

There's a tiny pink plantlet to the right of the pot!

The "leftovers" aren't necessarily useless, either. The rooted stem, once the head of the plant is removed, might begin growing small plantlets where leaves formerly grew, or even at the top where the "head" was removed. Since I had to cut the stem into more than one piece (it was THAT LONG), I threw them all in a pot together with the rooted bits to give them a chance to make some babies.


I don't know how this will turn out, but I'm hoping that at least the "heads" of the plants will root successfully, as they are some of my favorite. The little pink plantlets are just gorgeous, and unlike other mother-of-thousands plants, cannot grow into plants themselves.

The two rooted stems and the other cut pieces.

The Results!

Kalanchoe Blooms and Rebirth

The first plant is the tall stalk, the second is the recognizable fang plant next to it.

There is a type of kalanchoe that if it isn't, at least should be rather popular. Known colloquially as a "fang plant" or even "lambs ear" it features very large, spade-shaped leaves covered with soft fuzz and having curious pointy bumps on the outer surface. It's a fantastic plant, and the one I have has been through a lot, even a beheading and re-rooting. After about three years with  me, it decided to bloom. While it's amazing to have your succulents bloom, the succulents like kalanchoes and aeoniums that have the longest-lasting blooms also perish after blooming. Their flowers are their swan song.

Fresh blooms from about a month and a half ago.

Tall enough to be a super model.

The bloom (technically called an inflorescence) on my fang plant reaches almost six feet in height, which is astounding. It's a collection of symmetrical stalks with clusters of flowers at the ends. The radial symmetry is really quite... mathematical, as Finn and Jake would say.

Two separate plant bodies mean one survives.

This is my second kalanchoe to bloom. My first, which was tall, red, and gorgeous, bloomed all at once, which meant that I had to remove the entire plant (a rather large one) when it died soon after. My good luck in this case is that the fang plant had grown an offshoot which became it's own plant, and so even though this particular plant will die, the now-separated twin plant survives.

The plant loses nearly all leaves, leaving these strange gaps in its body.

Baby plant growing on the left side where a leaf formerly grew.

I'm extra-lucky in this case, as the fang plant generously decided to grow some baby plants on the flowering stalks. This happens with many succulents, but I haven't seen it on a kalanchoe before. At areas where a large leaf formerly grew, and on "crotches" where stems separate, the fang plant has grown little fuzzy green baby plants I will be able to pop off and root!

This is great, because I love this plant, and now I'll be able to spread it around the garden! It does pretty well with full sun (not all succulents do), and it will be nice to have some more of these fun and fuzzy plants.

Babies growing in crotches

Babies growing on the flower stalk where small leaves had grown and died.

The bloom/inflorescence today. Many flowers have died, some are still buds.

The large stem is the remains of the original plant's bloom.

For a little more context, I have some pictures of a different sort of kalanchoe my mother gave me. This particular plant bloomed and died, leaving an offshoot still attached to the dead flower stem, which I will need to remove with clippers. You can see the tall, dead stem next to the tiny left-over living plant. I left the stem on when I planted it in the ground as it gave me a very easy "handle" to move the plant with.

I haven't had this type of kalanchoe before, so it will be interesting to see what it grows into. I'm guessing that as I've planted it in full sun, it will be a nice red color, a guess supported by the red of the dead inflorescence.

Now that it's securely in the ground I can cut the dead stem down, if not completely off.

Succulents, Snails, and Slugs; A Safe Solution

In intrepid snail (or snails) climbed nearly five feet of brown stem to eat these leaves!

 A bane of succulent gardeners, and in fact, gardeners in general, is the (locally) common brown snail and the slimy slug. These little mollusks (yes, they're in the same category as some of your favorite seafood) absolutely adore juicy succulent plants, and will go to extreme lengths to munch on their plump leaves.

Crested crassula (Son of Yog Sothoth), I have several of these taken from the giant parent plant.

The plants I find most often devastated by these garden pests are my thicker-leaved aeoniums and my crested crassulas. It's very obvious that the large, flat expanses of stems and branches of the crested (or monstrose) plants make an easy path to the copious leaves, and the aeoniums are either accessible by climbing their stems, or in the case of some plants, are right there on ground level for easy access.

There is a very simple and safe way to deter snails and slugs from climbing and eating your plants. Simply by mashing up eggshells into small pieces and scattering them around the bases of affected plants, you can keep the slimy beasties from even nearing your plants. The eggshell pieces are sharp and piercing, quite uncomfortable to delicate mollusk skin. I've ever dusted the plant itself with the pieces.

Making snail and slug deterrent.

It's quite easy to make this eggshell snail deterrent. I have a mortar and pestle, but eggshells are easily smashed in a variety of ways. First, after using the egg itself, wait for the shell to dry. Once the shell is dry, smash it into pieces about 1-3 mm in diameter. If you do grind shells with a mortar and pestle, you will wind up with sandy particles to larger particles. Just don't let the shell pieces be longer than a few millimeters.

I store the smashed shells in a jar in my kitchen, and take them outside to sprinkle liberally as needed. They are safe and beneficial to the soil, and are biodegradable. This is an excellent way of keeping poisons out of your garden!

Aeonium Flowering and Windy Conditions

The brief thunderstorm we had the other morning was followed by some heavy winds, which are hell on arboreal aeoniums (aeoniums that are tree-like). Succulents tend to have very shallow roots, and while most plants have extensive root systems that anchor them in place, most succulent plants are quite easy to remove from the soil.

The replanted aeonium, now tied to old rebar and an iron sculpture.

The wind blew over the latest blooming stem on my oldest succulent, and I was nervous of it enough to immediately go out front to fix it, without putting on my gloves. ALWAYS PUT ON YOUR GLOVES! In my case, I was forced to improvise a stake for it, and while I had a good, steady item to tie the plant stem to, it was rough on my hands.

My first instinct, having no tall wooden stakes, was to use a second piece of rebar to stake this plant (I had used the first of the two leftovers to stake the large green euphorbia next to the aeonium). I shoved the rebar in as deep as I could, but it wasn't enough to keep the plant upright and steady.

Garden decor to the rescue! My brother went through a period of iron sculpture, and I am the proud owner of a couple of his pieces. One of our favorites, the Tree, is in the front yard. It's gotten magnificently rusted in the weather, and its structure allowed for me to rest the aeonium against a sort of crotch formed at the top of the sculpture.

This is where I should have worn my gloves. Rough, rusty iron. Bare hands. I'm lucky this was all I got:

Now, saving this plant may seem silly, because if you've read my other post on aeoniums, you will already know that if the plant is flowering, it is going to die afterward. Darn it, though, I've had this guy going in various offshoots for eight years, and I'm proud of the five foot tall plant! Besides, it has an offshoot I want to keep on the main plant as long as possible.

 You can see where the offshoot has grown lateral roots at its base. Hopefully, when the larger plant passes away, it will be easy to break off and simply plant on its own with roots already grown. If you look at the picture at the top, though, you'll see the stem is shaped like a horseshoe, so it's likely I will have to chop half of it off to end up with one straight stem.

Why is this titled in reference to flowering? Another one of my aeoniums is in the process! One of my ground-level plants that surrounds the feature agave is blooming! This patch of aeoniums started as a few small plants and a larger plant, which grew, and grew, and produced offshoots, etc...

I've just never had one of my newer guys bloom before! It would appear that aeoniums need perhaps at least four or five years of growth before they bloom and die. Since I only have one plant blooming, it is unlikely that the blossoms will be fertilized and produce viable seeds, same with the arboreal aeonium.

So, as far as propagation, your best bet is to hope for offshoots. This is standard for nearly all succulent plants. It's much easier to create new plants through offshoots and cuttings than by collecting and planting seeds. The good news is that in the time it takes for your aeonium to mature and flower (then die), it will likely produce many offshoots which can be separated into individual plants.

An offshoot of my first blooming aeonium. Just ONE leaf marred by snail nibbles. Grr.

A closer view of the offshoot. This type of aeonium is known as "cyclops" because of the "eye" pattern.

This little guy is an amazing survivor of the snails and has gotten sturdy enough to be transplanted to the foreground.