four leaves may be a it small to make it on their own. doable, but your chances of success increase with size (up to a point).

so, if you are only separating because you are pressed for space, leave the mother leaf on.

if the babies are big enough to make it on their own, you can remove them and plant the mother leaf again for another crop of babies (if you wish).

i've heard it works, though i try not to grow more than two babies from each leaf, simply because i don't have the space. Usually, i leave the mother leaf on until i have enough sturdy offspring, or it dies....

Karin

Good question and good advice Karin gave you.
Perhaps you can just separate the leaf clumps with each
large leaf attached to the baby. That is, remove one of the leaves
with the baby attached and plant it in its own little pot.
You can use something smaller such as a 2 oz solo cup,
plastic. The mother leaf will go on nourishing the babies for as long as it is attached. It might also grow another baby
if you leave it in the pot. The leaves on the baby should be about the size of a dime when ready to be removed. Four leaves does not sound like enough because the first two leaves don't count, they are called embryonic leaves and will eventually drop off. Leaves grow in threes, so you probably
will need to have a few whorls before wanting to separate
from the large leaf. But there is no need and no rush to
separate. (Basically, what Karin said!) Joanne
Glad to know that the container you chose was a good size.

Ok, I'm glad I asked. I thought 4 leaves was plenty, but I guess not. I will let them grow a while longer before separating. :) They've been slow to grow. I marked the date on the side of the cup; it was February.

The McDonald's parfait cup worked so well because - I forgot to say this part - because it's clear and it has a lid that snaps on. I put about 2 inches of soil in the bottom.

Little,

There is no reason you cannot put more than one leaf in a pot. I have several pots with three leaves in it. I think, as a newbie though, it may be easier with one to a pot when it comes to separating the plantlets.

It is better to let the plantlets attain some size and root systems before separating.

Don't hover!!! :)

Linda

Message from another newbie: I have learned so much from this thread! Thank you everyone. My leaves have not developed little ones yet. Maybe in a few weeks. My very first crop. I know Linda has told me not to hover! But, I do talk to them every day. Can't help it. Hope they listen to me. :) All in good fun. Have a happy day, toni

Talking to them is good. The scientific reason is that we exhale CO2 which they like and they exhale O2 which we like.

A member of another forum conducted an experiment to determine which leaves rooted faster: single leaf in a pot or several leaves in a community pot. Those in the latter rooted quicker & produced babies faster. This experiment was repeated a couple of times if I remember correctly and in each case leaves in the community pot sprouted first. The thinking is that leaves may sense competition & will strive to beat the others. I don't know how scientific this was but I thought the results were interesting.

Terri

Irina advocated putting several leaves in a pot, she said that leaves rooted near each other or together will sprout faster. Irina seemed to have a lot of scientific knowledge. She said it was the reproductive hormones.
Joyce Stork has also written that the plants when growing give off the same type of growth hormones that cause the plants to either grow or decline as a community. I finally figured out, it is the plants that have the addiction, not us, they just want there to be an infinite variety of them.
The only real issue is being sure to separate the resulting plantlings in a timely way, otherwise, the individual small plants do not have enough room to grow and remain small. The plants adjust to the space given to them. Joanne