Shop Products
Houzz Logo Print
wakeupcoffeeperk

Sick Jade :(

wakeupcoffeeperk
9 years ago

Hi Everyone,

I apologize in advance if this has come up recently, I'm incredibly worried about my Jade and have looked everywhere online for remedies but only seem to find conflicting information!

I have a large Jade that is at the very least 29 years old. It does need to be re potted into better draining soil as the soil it came to me in is not the best, so I know that's an important step in the near future, but I'm afraid to re pot as it seems sick to me right now. I think I may have either under watered or over watered it. I know it should be easy to know which I've done but because of the size of it I never know how much is too much so I always err on the side of caution and keep water from it until it's very dry. In the last month it's lost A LOT of leaves. It used to be very full but now it's so very thinned out from leaf drop. I can't seem to find any rhyme or reason to it. New, tiny leaves are dropping, large old leaves as well. Many of the sick leaves have brown around their edges until they fall off, some wrinkled. Some leaves are very thin, some very plump. Some are bright red, some aren't! Some are even curled. If this was a tiny plant I wouldn't be so bothered but at close to 30 years old and so big, it would break my heart for it to die. The soil seems dry to me at the moment but I'm afraid to water in case I've watered too much. (Last I watered was about 2 weeks ago, until water drained from the bottom, then I stopped.) I live in a province in Canada where it gets very cold. The room the jade is in is on the cool side, but never below ten degrees Celsius. I should mention, most of the winter it was in front of this window with no issue. We had a few nights that dropped in the minus 20's (Celsius) so worried about a draft i moved it back from the window about 2 feet. The room would always maintain at a cool ten degrees anyway. The drop seemed to start up when I moved it back from the window, but it was only a short distance away I didn't think it would make much of a difference, I just wanted to avoid a draft. I've since moved it back to the window to see if it is a light issue causing the drop. I'll try anything, I love this plant. Any help would be greatly appreciated. :)

Comments (10)

  • bikerdoc5968 Z6 SE MI
    9 years ago

    Couldn't agree more with Christopher. IMHO, however, in addition to removing the lower branch, I would cut it back severely .. I would make it almost naked. Trust me, some good light and it will bounce back before you know it.

  • Joe1980
    9 years ago

    Looks like the signs of overwatering, which is easy with what appears to be peat based bagged soil. It also is very leggy due to lack of adequate light.


    Joe

  • rina_Ontario,Canada 5a
    9 years ago

    Cooler temps are not a problem, jade will be ok even little below 10C (all my succulents overwintered in abt. 8C, np). Just make sure it is not touching glass of the window in cold weather.
    Are most of the red leaves small-young ones? They get red if getting lots of sun - it's not disease or anything bad
    It would be best to take it out, get rid of soil completely; use chopstick or wooden skewer to loosen up the soil around the root ball. Rinse it off. Inspect the roots; if you see any mushy/black (rotted), cut them off. Also any dead roots. Set it on some newspaper for a day or two to dry.
    When you take it out of pot, some branches may break. No problem, they could be potted and you get more plants.
    Consider comments from previous posters -
    Search this forum for lots of good info; here is just one of the threads, I am posting link to it since it has very good photos of roots being cleaned (also large jade):

    re-potting jade-click here


  • ctnesbit81
    9 years ago

    These responses are dead on. To add to the trimming back, if you trim it back you might be surprised with how quickly it explodes with new leaves.


  • ctnesbit81
    9 years ago

    Looking at the first images a little closer, it looks like you have a plastic pot inside of the glazed porcelain pot. I had a lot of trouble growing any succulents indoors that are not in a terracotta pot. You can do it, but you have to be REALLY careful to not over-water, which is obviously incredibly hard inside since the sun can't help you dry out the soil.

    Listen to these folks and your Jade buddy is going to be fine!


  • wakeupcoffeeperk
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Thanks so much everyone for all the tips! I did go ahead and take 5 good cuttings from it today, I'm wondering if I should let the parent heal before I repot? The jade is in fact in a plastic "self watering" pot inside of a larger porcelain pot. When I first became concerned about over watering I took it out of the porcelain pot and checked the little drainage compartment which was bone dry, which doesn't necessarily mean I didn't over water but I'm not totally convinced as seems the symptoms of overwatering and under watering are the same. So frustrating! I'm thinking a terra cotta a size larger than the plastic pot it's in should be ok? I'm only nervous about over shocking the plant by taking the cuttings today and repotting too soon after. I considered repotting first but due to the size of the thing I figured it would be easier to repot after first trimming it back but maybe this was the wrong order to do things. One more odd question: I used root hormone on the cuttings I took today, and plan on giving them some time to callous before potting, but should I do anything with the parent plant where I took the cuttings from to help it heal as well?

    Thanks again for all the help :)

  • wakeupcoffeeperk
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    Rina_ -yes, there are several new little leaves that are bright red but also a few larger ones. This was my fault because I got so used to admiring it from one angle that I forgot to turn it and all the leaves on one side turned red. Not damaged or anything, it doesn't really get hot enough or bright enough here in the winter/spring to do any real damage. :)

  • rina_Ontario,Canada 5a
    9 years ago

    Don't worry about re-potting original plant if you pruned it. Can you post photo/close up where you took cutting? And maybe photo of whole plant after pruning.
    You can re-pot it but make sure you have well draining mix ready. I don't think you need bigger pot but definitely not self-watering. Terracotta pot would be good - make sure it has drainage holes. Glazed pot doesn't 'breath'.
    Rooting hormone is OK (I don't use it on jades at all). Let cutting callous and then pot up.
    Red color isn't a problem as I mentioned before. I was just wondering if all leaves have red color.
    Give plant as much light as possible.
    Can you keep it outside once it gets warm enough? They grow very well that way...Rina


  • wakeupcoffeeperk
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I did go ahead and re pot the parent, the root ball appeared quite healthy and fairly dry. No bad smell or discoloured roots so I think that's a good sign. I re potted with a succulent mix and added quite a bit of pearlite, I'm hoping this will be ok. There still seems to be a little bit of leaf drop but not nearly as much as there had been over the last couple of weeks. With that said, my Jade is as bare as it's ever been. Between the cuttings I've taken and the drop, it's looking pretty naked. I ended up taking 6 cuttings, even though I could have easily taken a dozen more. I was nervous that it would all be too much of a shock to the plant. Some of the cuttings I used root hormone, others I didn't. I've had success propagating from this Jade before without the use of any hormone, just thought I'd give it a try this time and see what happens. The cuttings appeared healthy, but I'm not really sure what I'm looking for in a healthy stem... After re potting the parent, I waited a day before giving a light watering but with distilled water this time as I've been noticing little crystals appearing on some of the leaves which I suspect could be minerals in the city water? I'm trying everything to bring this Jade back! :) I don't think I've made much difference to the overall look of the parent plant. 6 cuttings seemed to hardly made any difference at all. When the current cuts heal I plan on pruning back even more. I may end up with 1 parent Jade and 30 babies, but I don't think I could bring myself to throw them out.

    As soon as we're back in the double digits I will be bringing it outside as much as I can. At the moment we are still at about minus 10 some days, but it will get warm eventually! In the summer we can get high humidity. I know Jade's do not like this, but would short periods of time outside be ok?