Jades need very little water. I water mine about once every 2 weeks.

Thanks! What should I do about it now though? Can I rescue it before the whole thing dies?

My two (small) Jades tend to droop very quickly. I was watering my smallest 1-2 times a week and then the leaves would go back to normal and be firm. I'm confused about it myself but it seems to be working out for me to water when the leaves droop down.

Whenever one of my jades has something funny going on, I check the roots. Can you unpot, take a look at the roots, and update us? Post pics if you can. It's ok to leave it out of soil while we figure out what's going on.

Can you put this jade outside? (shade to acclimate it & not burn it) Where are you located/zone? It helps us give you better advise for your climate.

Sometimes I have jades or other succulents that looked sad after winter and just putting them outside (where they belong) to get more sun & warm air works wonders. If it doesn't improve in about a week or so, I would repot it, look at the roots for rot. I recommend potting soil with half part of pumice, it's so full of nutrients (perlite or small course rocks would be an ok substitute if you don't have pumice).

I water my jades when the soil is dry, I feed them too with some fertilizer and water them thoroughly, not in sips. If you wait to water them when the leaves feel wrinkled, that stresses them out and they grow a lot less.

I notice the pot is sitting right on a coaster, it would be better if the pot was raised up for air movement.

You should repot with a better draining soil as suggested above. When you water let the water run out the drain hole. Then don’t water again until dry. No “sips” of water. you shouldn’t let it sit in water in that saucer. Yes, it would love outside time this summer. These are tough plants and yours should be ok with proper potting mix and proper watering. I’m thinking a shallower saucer might help too. Let us know how it goes.

I pulled it out of the pot to try to expose the roots. They’re pretty entangled in the shape of the pot but the soil around it was pretty dry. I’ll try to repost it with the pumice or perlite and some fresh soil or compost. If the roots are that deep does that mean it needs a larger pot? I do live in an apartment in NYC so I don’t have outdoor space to put it. I do normally leave the window it is sitting in wide open unless it’s raining.

You need to pls remove all the old soil or you'll take the problems w/ you. Crumble it off w/ your fingers, a fork, anything, but pls remove it all otherwise the old soil & the new soil together are likely to have drainage problems.

No larger pot pls; once you remove all the old soil likely there won't be as many roots as one might think.

Pls go out & get Cactus & Succulent mix & Perlite, combining those in equal portions. Like 1 cup if each, then mix well & repot. Don't water for a day or 2 afterwards.

Just to add what Karen said: Katie mentioned using pumice and perlite; so if that's the case, perhaps mix it in 1/3rd amounts. If using only perlite, mix it 50/50; it could be even more perlite (as much as 60 or even more %). It is best to sift or rinse the perlite, using ordinary kitchen sieve. That way you'll get rid of dust. If sifting, try not to breathe the dust...

Rina,

Since I've got both Perlite & Pumice, may I pls ask what's the purpose of using them together?

My sense has been they largely do the same thing, so I tend to use one or the other (Perlite w/ my Houseplants, Tropicals; Pumice w/ my C&S & my Hoyas). TIA.

I believe the pumice perlite combo was a misunderstanding. I said I was going to try using one of the two not both together. Thanks for all the tips! Going to clean all the soil off the roots and repot in the same pot without the saucer in a 50/50 or 60/40 perlite and cactus soil combo. I also plan to more thoroughly water once every 7-10 days versus a little bit of water ever 3ish. Will keep it in the same very sunny window open to fresh air! Hopefully all this helps rescue the leaves that are wilted already! Thanks everyone for all the help! Will keep you updated!

I’m a newbie to this, and it sounds like you got some good advice, but I’d like to add my two cents. I got a cutting from a jade plant that appears to be the same species as yours and rooted it. I have it sitting under a grow lamp 24/7 and it’s growing well. I give it a light watering every two to three days. Water never runs out the bottom. I put it in Miracle Grow Cactus/Succulent/Palm mix, not mixed with anything else.

My guess is that your jade plant isn’t getting enough light, in addition to your drainage problems. I think more light would help with your drainage problems for a couple reasons. First, it would help to dry the soil more quickly by warming it up. Next, it would encourage your jade plant to grow more quickly, which would also have the effect of drying the soil, since the increased growth would require more water, which it would suck out of the soil.

Here’s a pic of my jade plant. You’ll notice it’s a little different color than yours, but the mother plant is the same color as yours. The mother plant sits in front of a window where it rarely, if ever gets direct sunlight (because of its aspect). It’s in a mix of soil and river rock, so it’s well-drained, but it really doesn’t look super-healthy to me.

Again, I’m just a newbie, but my approach to succulents is to give them all the light they can handle, and if I find out I’m giving them too much light I back it off. IME this species of jade plant can handle quite a bit of light and seems to do better when it gets a lot of light.

Very good, Katie! As for watering, get some wooden kitchen skewers and when you think the plant needs water, press the skewer into the soil for a few minutes. When you pull it out if it’s dry you can water, if the tip is moist wait a bit. Thanks for keeping us posted, we always love follow up stories.

Kate

Sorry, I missed "or". Either is good to use, and they cold be mixed together in order to make more inorganic mix.

Karen

Yes, they perform very similarly. I am not suggesting mix of both is a must, but they could be mixed as mentioned above. Some ppl do not like perlite since it is very light and floats. I use lots of it since that's what I can get very easily. Using gravel, I do not complain much about perlite floating -- gravel helps to keep it down. Pumice is light too, but I don't see anyone complaining about it floating. And it may look better to some than whiter perlite. If I had pumice, I probably wouldn't use it for jades - they are very easy plants to grow. I would 'save' pumice for other plants. But if you have plenty and is easy to get, more inorganic mix doesn't hurt :)

Katie,

Sorry, I too missed the OR. Thanks RIna, I thought as much, similar uses. Personally, I've never had the floating perlite issue.

Have a friend who's a Begonia freak & she roots stem & tip cuttings in moistened perlite, then bagged & closed. I keep meaning to try that, the Perlite is reminding me.

These are the roots uncovered from the soil. They seem very dry and were really tughtly embedded in chunks of soil. Replanting with the perlite/succulent mix! They should hopefully be much happier!

These are the roots uncovered from the soil. They seem very dry and were really tughtly embedded in chunks of soil. Replanting with the perlite/succulent mix! They should hopefully be much happier!

You can trim all dry-dead roots.

Are you planning on potting them together or separately? Just wondering...:)

Ok! I was just going to put them back together. Is it better if they are separate or together is good because that’s how they were before?

It is really up to you. My preference is single plant, but do as you like. Consider how you like to see your plant growing.

Growers put usually few cuttings in same pot. I like to see the plant itself, and sometimes they could 'interfere' with each other and some could get growing crooked, being pushed out of the way by neighbor plant. I do have couple of them with 2 stems/trunks (IIRC, in Bosai they refer to that style 'Mother & Daugher'...or something similar). But it is actually a side branch growing very low that I didn't trim off, or a new trunk growing from the same rootball: