Caring For Your Jade Plant: Crassula Ovata Basic Care Tips

Written by Savannah Toal

Crassula ovata aka the jade plant is a beautiful houseplant succulent that's a resilient bad biddy! Easy to propagate and even easier to grow, Jade plant just might take over your home!

Jade Plant has been one of my favorites from the beginning of my plant journey. My grandmother (go figure) introduced me and showed me how easy it was to care for. She has a 20 + year old jade plant in her bedroom. It's absolutely breathtaking. She also showed me how to propagate them, which you will come to find is so easy.

What is Crassula Ovata?

Jade Plant is a succulent that has thick, waxy leaves and stems that store water. These plants are originally from South Africa where they can grow to about 10 feet! It's basically like having little trees or shrubs in your home. If you give the plant the right conditions, or you're just plain lucky it can even blossom white flowers! They store water in their leaves, stems, and roots. Making them great houseplants for those plant parents who always seem to forget that last time they watered.

There are few plants as easy to look after than this bonsai-like succulent and it's even easier to propagate them.

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How to Care for Jade Plant

The jade plant, lucky plant, or the money plant is an all-time favorite of mine and is so easy to take care of!

Watering Your Jade Plant

An important part of caring for your jade plant is to make sure that it gets enough water, but not too much water. A quick water tip is to stick your finger in the soil and if the soil is dry to your knuckle...give her a good water shower.

Make sure you allow the soil to dry before watering again as these plants will die from overwatering. If you see leaves suddenly drop or you notice distorted growth, you have probably overwatered. If you are a forgetful plant parent, this is the perfect house plant for you.

Light Requirements for a Jade Plant

Jade plants are succulents, but they aren't too fussy about the amount of light it gets. It does grow best with bright indirect light.

If your jade plant is not getting enough sun they will let you know. They will start to stretch their little plant bodies looking for any morsel of sunlight they can find. They will become stunted and leggy or in technical terms, etiolated, for all my plant nerds out there.

Propagating Your Jade Plant

Propagating a jade plant is probably the easiest, and I mean the easiest, thing you can learn how to do. My girl, Jade, is actually what got me hooked on making more plants from the plants that I already had. I mean who doesn't like free plants. My grandma would just pinch the mother plant with her fingers and throw the cutting into the backyard. I went down to see the area where she was throwing the cuttings and there was a whole sea of jade thriving. There are two basic ways you can propagate a jade plant: leaf propagation or trimming a cutting.

Leaf Propagation

Leaf propagation can be done by gently twisting a healthy leaf off of the mother plant. Then simply place the leaf on top of the dirt and in a couple of weeks, you will start to see roots growing and then eventually a little jade plant.

Trimming a Cutting

My favorite way of propagating jade plant is by trimming or pinching a cutting off of the mother plant. You can do this by simply finding a part of your plant that looks suitable to trim. If the plant is small and has not branched off - trim the top! Then place the cutting in the soil and watch a new plant start to grow! Click here for a quick video on how I do this.If your plant has already branched you can trim where you see the brown rings. Simply trim along those rings where you want. Place the cutting on or in the soil and I promise you, roots will grow! I like to put the cuttings in a separate pot or recycled plastic container and wait for them to root before planting in them in their new home! I have propagated plenty of gifts for my friends this way and they seem to love it (hopefully lol). Fun gift tip: find a cute and unique planter from a thrift store for your new plant gift! Click here for more info on styling your plant.

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Quick Care Tips

Light:

Can survive in medium light situations, but thrive in bright indirect and direct light. They can survive outside during the summer, but need to be acclimated gradually to the change in light intensity.

Temperature:

This bad biddy is highly tolerant of most temperatures and humidity. They can even survive in light frost but will die in freezing conditions.

Watering:

Like most succulents, it's best to allow the soil to completely dry out...like bone dry before watering again. Water more liberally during active months (Spring and Summer) and less during the winter months!

Fertilizer:

Jade can be fertilized every two months during the active months.

Jade plants will always hold a special place in my heart. It's so easy to grow and it spawned a green thumb I have no control over! I hope you come to find the same love for Jade as I do!

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Happy Planting,

Savannah