Pot it up in fresh soil that is light and airy. If you are using regular potting soil, try adding a healthy amount of perlite. Then water it in, let it drain, and enclose the pot and plant inside a ziplock bag. Place in bright light but not in direct sun. In the high humidity environement of the baggie it will be able to reroot. When the leaves have recovered and the plant is showing signs of growth you can open up the bag to slowly expose the plant to lower levels of humidity. After a month or so of this you can remove the bag entirely. I use the same method to root leaves. Another thing you can do with limp leaves is to cut them again to make a fresh cut on the base and then soak in a bowl of water--until the leaf becomes turgid. That usually takes about a day. Then remove from the water and pot up. If you leave the leaf floating in water for longer it will start to rot, so don't let it soak in the water for more than a day or two.

Jon

Thank you. I forgot to mention that I had soaked the leaf and that this part worked well. Also, I had potted the streptocarpus in fresh soil but I had not watered it. I thought I had to wait until the leaves had recovered!

Re soaking limp leaves - I find that if you put just the cut end of the leaf in a little container of quite warm water (almost hot, but use your common sense!) it will become turgid more quickly than soaking the whole leaf. I also change the water from time to time if it gets cold. I have found this reduces the risk of the leaf rotting. If you really want to minimize your chances of rot use perlite alone to root although I find it is a little slower than a vermiculite mix.

Here is a link that might be useful: where I picked up the tip about warm water

Oooh, another little interesting tidbit to file away in my brain--thanks, Bloomingpotty. I didn't mention that one of our gesneriad club members roots streps in water when he is propagating them. He figured this out before he joined our group and hadn't yet communicated with any other growers. On his own, he learned how to grow spectacular streps.

Anyway, he roots them by propping up the leaf and rooting it with just enough water to cover about a quarter inch of the stem. Then when the roots are about a quarter to three quarter inches long he pots them up. I have yet to experiment with his method, but it sounds like a good idea. Something I am curious to see is if this will work in winter. I know that many types of plants will root in water in summer but are more tricky at other times of the year, even though they are indoors.

Jon

Thank you both. It's all very interesting.

Jon, I've rooted a leaf in water successful over the winter by accident. I had broken a leaf and plopped it into a glass of water until I had time to deal with it. A month later, I still didn't get around to it and I just topped up the water. I don't know who kept watering it, but the next time I looked at it, there was a full-sized plantlet with four leaves at least a couple of inches long on it! I had tried rooting in water before and the leaf rotted. You may be right, Jon that rooting in water may work best in the winter.

Thanks, Bloomingpotty, for the warm water trick. I've left a cold leaf in a sink of cold water for at least two days because when it didn't firm up within an hour, I went on to do other things. I'll do the warm water thing next time.

How is your plant doing Bumblebee? I've never been able to save a plant that started to rot. Although I'm crossing my fingers on the two remaining of five plants that I bought recently. They were in a really spongy soil mix and were way too wet. I didn't get around to repotting them until I'd had them for a month. The two plants I have left have been potted down from a 4½" pot to 2½" pot.

My streptocarpus is all right. Thank you for asking.