Transcript:
Hey, what’s up plant lovers? My name is Sam. And today we get to talk about one of my absolute favorite plants. The jade plants, also known as the Crassula ovata. Now there are a lot of different types of jade plants like a classic jade plant, also known as money plant friendship plant and it is said to bring luck to you when a friend brings it as a housewarming gift, and then, of course you also get varieties like this. These ones are known as Gollum Hobbit’s ogre ears. There’s a million names for it, but I absolutely love this one to me. It just looks like coral under the sea, and I just think that that is so fantastic. Okay, let’s go over the care for this plant, starting with the light requirements. This guy likes a lot of sun. Give him as much direct sun as you possibly can. It’s recommended that they get a minimum of four hours of direct sunlight each day. West facing or south-facing window would be absolutely perfect for this guy here, but I really have to mention just how versatile I think these plants are. I really recommend this plant for people who have less than ideal lighting conditions and still want to grow succulents because even though it’s recommended to keep this plant where it can get at least four hours of direct sun a day, I actually keep mine on a North westish kind of facing window, and it gets almost no direct sunlight every day and it doesn’t grow very quickly and it doesn’t really have those red edges so much, but honestly, it’s still very happy and still very healthy, so if you have less than ideal lighting conditions, and you really want one of these, go for it because it’s probably going to be fine. It’s such a great plant, even though this plant absolutely adores lots and lots of direct sun, its leaves can actually burn, so just be mindful of that. If you’re seeing leaf burn, which basically looks like brown marks on your leaves. It literally looks like a burn. If you’re seeing a lot of that, then it’s probably one of two things either. It’s too close to the window and that window gets really really hot and a lot of direct sunlight, and in which case you can just sort of pull that back because often a window glass can amplify the rays of the sun, or it’s that you used to have it in a less sunny spot and you moved it to a sunnier location, but you didn’t do it gradually if you want to move it from a less sunny to a sunnier location. Do make sure that you’re doing it. In gradual steps that way, it’s acclimatizing to its new lighting situations and decreasing. Its chances of burned leaves. When should you water this guy? He is a succulent he holds water in his leaves, so he doesn’t need as much down in his soil. So make sure that you are letting your soil completely 100 dry out in between waterings. Over watering is the biggest killer of jade plants because they are susceptible to root rot. So really make sure that you’re waiting for the soil to completely dry out before you’re watering again and something kind of interesting about these plants is that they’re actually quite sensitive to hard water and fertilizer salt buildup and they’re going to show you pretty quickly on their leaves. You’re actually going to see little white deposits all over them. It looks like little white dots, and you can rub them off, but it is quite unsightly, so if you’re noticing something like that, I definitely recommend switching to either rain water or filtered water to know. If you should be watering your plant, you can obviously do the finger test by sticking your finger down in the soil and making sure the whole thing is completely dry, or you can also do the leaf test, so you grab one of the leaves, and you sort of try to squish it, and if it’s a little bit flexible and has some give to it, then it’s a good time to water, however, if it’s super plump and firm, and you can’t squish it around without breaking the leaf, it’s fully quenched and doesn’t need anything from you. If you’ve over watered your plant, you’re going to notice that the leaves look kind of squishy, waterlogged and a little bit yellowish. If you’ve under watered your plants, then you’re going to notice. Shriveled leaves and likely little brown spots on the leaves as well. If you’re finding this video helpful, please plant your finger on that like button. Jade plants really don’t need a whole lot of fertilizer. I only fertilize my jade plant twice a year once in the spring and then again in the summer and then in the fall and winter, when it’s slowing down its growth and potentially going dormant. I don’t give it any fertilizer at all and like we’ve already talked about because this plant is sensitive to salt. I do recommend using an organic fertilizer. I use a fish fertilizer, and if you’re interested in that, I’ll link that down below. But something organic is definitely going to be beneficial for this plant for soil. This guy’s really going to benefit from something super gritty, super well draining. Get that water out of there so that we don’t end up with that root rot. There are a few different ways to propagate this wonderful plants. You can either do leaf propagation or you can take a little bit of a cutting. I definitely recommend taking a cutting with a little bit of the stem because these just root up much faster for things like humidity and temperature. I love this guy because he’s easy. He doesn’t need a bunch of humidity, so if you live in a dry home and you want some easy care plants? This one is a really good choice and for temperature, he basically just doesn’t want to go. Below 50 degrees Fahrenheit, 10 degrees Celsius. These plants are so beautiful, and I think one of the coolest things about them is that they turn into trees over time. So you can see that the trunk. The base here has actually become quite Woody and I just love that I really want my jade plants to turn into large trees over time, so I’m extremely excited for that, But because they do that they can sometimes get a little unruly. So if you’re noticing your jade plant isn’t looking too good in its growth habit. Just prune it back. They take pruning really, really well, and it’s a good way to keep them in a beautiful, tight compact shape. Oh, and if you want to, you can totally turn these into a cute little bonsai tree. How cool is that? Yeah, cool, right. Thank you so much for watching My name is sam. This is mine! The leaves and I hope you’re taking care of your plants and yourself.