Checking in on some propagation

A few weeks ago, I took the seeds from a gerber daisy blossom and planted them in some soil, which I have kept pretty wet.  (Gerber daisy seed post)  Below are photos at almost exactly 3 weeks later.

I had them outside for a little bit, on my stoop which faces South.  But I was a little weary of all that exposure and wasn't sure if the little sprouts would take well to a blasting of sun 16 hours a day, so I moved them up to an East facing window sill, which gets pretty strong sun from about 5:30 or 6 till about noon.

Additionally, my sedum clippings appear to be sprouting some new growth as well!  You may recall a post back in May where I showed some sprouts that I removed from the "mother trunk" and some "leaves" that I plucked from the trunk, in an attempt to propagate.  I believe all of the sprouts have taken root, because when I tug on them, I either pull too hard and hear roots tearing, or I get enough resistance that I stop tugging!

In this photo you can see the new cluster of leaves forming at the base of the leaf where it meets the soil.  I am pretty excited to see how this one develops!  Of the half dozen or so of these that I am trying, this is the only one I have noticed to show such growth.  This is about 6 weeks after I initially plucked the leaf and stuck it in soil.

Because these cuts are in a tiny terracotta pot, I try to water it every morning or every evening.  It seems that succulents root better during propagation attempts when they are kept on or near consistently moist soil.

Sun Burn

A new thing I'm trying this summer is to put plants outside by my front door.  This may be a little aggressive, because with the way my apartment is laid out, all my windows face East, North or West, and my front door faces South.  So plants that are used to brief periods of sunlight are suddenly fully exposed all day long.  And it's been a little bit warm out there.  So I am finding that after a few days, no matter what plant I try, there is sun burn.

I've read that you should really stage this, like do 4 hours the first couple days and slowly increase exposure allowing plants time to adjust.  However, I work a full-time job and somehow I think that exposing the plants to the sun between the hours of 5am and 8am won't really help it transition to all day.  So I've been trying this all or nothing approach.

Below you can see some examples of the sun burn.

Wandering Jew:
(I haven't decided yet whether I'm going to let this one ride it out or if I'm going to move it to a shadier spot or just bring it back inside.)

Sedum clippings:

Kalanchoe:

Jade Jewel (Dracaena)

I don't usually purchase plants of this size (I like to start them from itty bitty babies), but since I had a gift card I decided to splurge on something a little further along!  The plant did not come with an instructional tag, so after a bit of research I have deduced the following:

1.) Propagate:

2.) Water: regularly, do not overwater

3.) Light: indirect light

4.) Fertilize:

5.)

As you can see, I don't have much figured out with this one!  But it appears to be making progress with growth.  My understanding is they can reach a decent height, such that I may be able to trim back the lowest leaves, exposing the "trunk" to make it look like a palm.

April 2014:

June 2014:

After just two months, we already show signs of steady growth!  Granted, we are in the growing-est point of the year, approaching the summer solstice.

Weekend Clean Up

When I returned home this weekend I went around to check on my various babes.  It looks like I may have gotten some sprouts out of the gerber daisy seeds I planted last week!

At least I hope that's what the growth is and not some miscellaneous plant that came in from the soil or more likely the rainwater.   I noticed this past week that a few of my pots have fungi growing in them!  I can only imagine the rainwater batch I was using had some spores.  Luckily they don't seem to last long, I think they get fried in the sun.

My original polka dot plant was looking like it need a new pot.  If you recall, that thing got pretty tall last summer/fall then fell into a deep dormant state.  Now it is starting to grow again, so I want the new root system to expand in fresh new soil in a new pot.  And hopefully divide the plant in the process!  So I dug it out of its pot and found quite the massive root ball:

I divided the ball and stems into two chunks, since there are essentially two stems coming out of it.  The one was a little larger than the other, so in the end I used three different sized pots.  The ittiest of bittiest pots is for what appears to be a new stem/baby altogether.  Observe:

In other news, my super ultra dense bajillionth generation wandering jew looks to be doing very well!  

This wandering jew appears to be making a comeback from its leggier, stringier beginnings.  I've placed it outside in what I hope will be enough shade behind this pot of future sunflowers.

You can see I moved my ivy outside, too.  It wasn't doing so well inside for some reason.  Half the leaves on one side were getting droopy.  I'm not sure if it was because I neglected to water it or if its this weird infestation that appears to have covered all the leaves in a cobweb like coating.  I didn't take any detail photos of it before I shook it off and attempted to drench the plant after setting it outside.  I'll have to keep you posted on those developments.  Not sure if it's a good idea, but something tells me putting the plant out in the fresh air and sunshine might help ward off whatever those creepers are.  Or the environmental shock may just put the plant out of its misery!  We shall see.

Planting Gerber Daisy Seeds

A couple days ago my Gerber Daisy's second bloom was starting to droop and drop its petals.  The prior weekend my parents had helped me transplant some various flowers and also gave me an Oriental Poppy spent bud, and said that in time the bud would open to reveal a boat load of seeds.  As I took a closer look at the dropping daisy, I pondered if this plant spread seeds in a similar fashion.  With a little help from Google, it turned out my suspicions were correct!

Below is the daisy as it is dropping and dispensing seeds.

From what I have read, most of the seeds are "infertile."  You should look for the larger ones that actually appear to have a seed-like element in its shaft.  In the photo below, that would be the two at the top.  The rest, you can see, are very narrow.

So the idea is to plant these seeds, with the white tufts at the surface of the soil.  So, I poked little holes in the soil, dropped in the seeds, and packed the soil around the seed's top.  Then I watered very gingerly.

Plunging a hole:

Dropping a seed:

Watering:

 I found about 6 or 7 of these seeds, so I have 4 containers set up, some with two seeds, some with one.  I read that germination takes about 2 weeks, so I will have to follow-up this post at that time.  The thought of having 4 more pots of gerber daisies is pretty awesome!

Here's the original bloom I bought back in late March 2014:

Succulent Propagation Struggling Outdoors

So I realize that taking brand new baby succulents, that don't even have roots yet, and sticking them in new soil, thrusting them out into a wilderness mix of more intense sunlight and more extreme temperatures is probably a terrible idea.  But I tried it anyway.  I wanted a companion piece to my hanging basket and since my door faces south, I figured it would be some great light for the succulents.  Well, the temperature is still dipping down pretty low in these late May weeks.  And it is starting to show on my plants.  So tonight I decided I would start bringing the pots in at night.  I walk right past them going in and out of my house, this should be a task I will remember to do.

May 2014, brought the plants inside:

Hard to see in the below image, but the sedum leaves have dark brown splotches on them.  Such significant contrasting color change in such a short period of time can never be a good sign.

I think I will keep these little propagation pots inside on the window sill with the terrariums.  I slipped plastic sleeves into the saucers to prevent the overflow from further damaging the wood window sill.

Conversely, the "terrarium" propagations look like they are handling their new location, a west-facing window just inside my front door.

Kalanchoe

I first bought this plant from Frederick's Flowers back in September 2013.  It was in bloom already so I'm not sure how long the bloom typically lasts.  I believe blooms started to fall off in the winter time.  It didn't really get totally bare until a couple months ago.  In some recent research, you are supposed to cut the flower stems back after the blooms fall off, to promote new blooms in the next season.  I think I am in the blooming season now because some blooms are starting up again.

September 2013:

April 2014:

After my recent post about propagating some succulents, I remembered that this rascal was a succulent and, shoot, it's grown so much new foliage over the past few months, why not try ripping some of that off - excuse me, pruning it back - and using the clippings as potential propagations.  The first thing I did was to remove undesirable leaves.  In the photo below you can see I have cut off or pulled off the oldest leaves at the bottom, most of which had started to turn crispy brown at the tips.  I'm not sure why they turned brown like that, but that's a mystery for another post.  Another thing to note is that those leaves are monsters compared to the new growth.  I'm wondering if the new green leaves will enlarge as much as the older leaves are or if I should be modifying my care of this plant.

April 2014:

In the photo below you can see that I am trying some cluster clippings and some leaf clippings.  Usually I find that cluster clippings (for plants in general) develop faster, so we'll see how these pan out.  It seems that with succulents you need to let them "dry out" or "callus over" before you try to get the new clippings to grow roots.  So here I have laid them out on a dry East-facing window sill to sit for a few days.

 Here is the post-pruning mama plant with some minimal new blooms:

I also decided now would be a good time to repot, mainly because I had just purchased some potting soil that is supposed to be good for succulents and cactuses.  You can see in the photo below that this plant has not become "root bound" in the pot, so I figure I will just try to remove as much of the soil from the rootball without damaging the root system, and repot into the same pot using some new cactus soil.

I have to post photos of the newly modified succulent cluster - I moved it outside onto my front door stoop, hopefully so it can get some more direct sunlight throughout the day, since my door faces South.  Although I do have some concern that going from 9 months in my climate-controlled house to every day in rising and lowering temperatures and humidity levels may be a bit too much of a shock for many of the new clippings to survive.  Perhaps tomorrow I will take some out and bring them back inside to use as a "control group."