This doesn't look worrisome unless the dark circle starts moving up the stem. 65 to 75 degrees is too cool though, 75 to 85 would be much better and speed up growth. Maybe consider a propagation or reptile heat mat to place the cutting on. If the dark area increases, cut it off making sure there's no indication of rot in center of the stem. You could dip the end in a powdered rooting agent like Rootone which contains a fungicide, or try cinnamon if you don't like chemicals. I don't think you'll have this issue though.

This is the danger of buying one-node cuttings, if rot starts there's not a lot of stem to cut off and if you lose the node there's no backup like there would be with 2 or more.

Thank you for the tips Russ1023!!

I’m definitely going to look into getting a heating mat.

I got it for extremely cheap locally, and with it even being rooted I figured it‘d be worth a shot even with the low success rate.

I did notice It started looking a bit mushy in the small spot of stem touching the soil, so I went ahead and used a sharp knife to make the clean cut off, then dusted it with the cinnamon I had on hand.

The remaining tissue looks really healthy and has already re-calloused without problem!

I also added perlite to the top of the soil to try to create a barrier to stop the stem from rotting again from the soil moisture.

Again, thank you for your time!

Taylor, smart move to cut the stem clean. I don't have a lot of faith in cinnamon but friends I know like it and say it's fairly effective. If you get a mat I think you'll see a big difference in growth rate and health of the cutting.

Good luck.

Russ, I did get a seedling mat that has kept temps around 74-77 around the plant.

I noticed the browning ring came back yesterday, and have noticed this water like stuff that reminds me of leaf guttation that has slowly turned into a almost gel like substance now... it’s been happening for about 4 days now, and I know it isn’t from my other plants because I have it away from anything that could drip on it.

I’ve tried looking it up but haven’t seen anything similar from just a stem?