Gadenin日本語Get the appThe year at a glance
A jade plant runs on a clear annual rhythm: it grows hard in spring, pauses in the worst summer heat, grows again in autumn, and rests cold and dry through winter. Almost everything you do well or badly comes down to matching your watering, feeding and pruning to which of those four phases the plant is in.
Note the date each spring when you see the first new leaf pair, and the date in autumn when growth restarts after the summer pause. Those two dates repeat closely year after year in a given home, and once you know them you stop guessing about when to prune and when to feed.
| Season | What the plant is doing | Your jobs | Water and feed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spring | Strongest growth of the year | Prune for shape, repot, take cuttings | Every ten to fourteen days, half strength feed monthly |
| Early summer | Steady growth, moving outdoors | Harden off outside, turn the pot regularly | Every seven to ten days, feed once |
| High summer | Paused in the heat | Shade from the fiercest sun, keep rain off | Every two weeks, no feed |
| Autumn | Second growth flush, then slowing | Bring it indoors in stages, check for pests | Stretching to every three weeks, stop feeding |
| Winter | Resting. Flower buds set on mature plants | Keep cold, bright and dry. Do not prune | Every four to six weeks, a small amount |
Pruning: how a thick trunk is actually made
A jade plant left unpruned makes a few long sprawling stems that lean under their own weight and shed their lower leaves. A pruned one makes a short thick trunk with a dense head, because every cut forces two shoots where there was one, and the stem below has to thicken to carry them.
Prune in spring, as growth restarts, so the wounds seal quickly and the new shoots have a full season to harden. Use a clean sharp blade and cut just above a leaf pair. Take no more than a third of the plant in one year, and stand back and look at it between every few cuts.
- Decide the height of the trunk first Choose how tall you want the bare trunk to be before you cut anything, and work to that. Most people go too tall. A trunk of four to eight inches under the head looks far sturdier than one twice that.
- Cut the leader back to force branching Shortening the main shoot to just above a leaf pair makes two new shoots from that pair. Repeating this each spring, at successively higher points, is the whole technique for a dense head.
- Remove the stretched sections entirely Any length of stem with wide gaps between leaf pairs was grown in poor light and will never fill in. Cut it out back to well spaced growth, and root the tip as a cutting.
- Take off crossing and inward shoots Remove branches that grow back through the center or rub against another. Air and light in the middle of the plant keeps the inner leaves alive and discourages pests.
- Balance the weight around the trunk Shorten the heaviest side rather than propping the plant up. A jade that leans permanently will keep leaning, and the trunk thickens unevenly.
- Leave the cuts open and hold off water Do not seal or paint the cuts. Keep the plant slightly dry for a week afterwards so the wounds callus over cleanly.
Pruning material is free plants. Every piece three inches or longer with a few leaf pairs will root, so dry the cut ends for a week and pot them up rather than composting them.
Getting an old plant to flower
The clusters of small white or pale pink star flowers on a mature Crassula are the reward for treating it as a succulent rather than a houseplant. Plants do not flower until they are mature, and no amount of feeding brings that forward. What triggers the buds is the combination of age, strong light through the growing season, and a winter that is genuinely cold, bright and dry.
The most common reason an otherwise healthy old jade plant never flowers is that it spends the winter in a warm living room being watered every fortnight. It stays comfortable, keeps growing slowly, and never receives the signal.
| Requirement | What it means in practice | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Age | Usually four years or more, with a woody trunk | A young plant will not flower whatever you do |
| Summer light | Full sun outdoors, or the brightest window you have | The plant needs reserves before it can flower |
| Winter cold | Bright and 41 to 50F (5 to 10C) for six to eight weeks | The cold period is what actually sets the buds |
| Winter drought | A small amount of water every four to six weeks | Wet warm winters keep it vegetative |
| Short days | No artificial light nearby in the evenings | A lamp on until midnight can suppress bud set |
| Pot | Slightly potbound rather than freshly moved up | Root restriction encourages flowering over growth |
Once the buds appear, and after flowering
Buds usually show as tight clusters at the shoot tips in late winter and open over several weeks. The one thing that ruins them is moving the plant, which drops buds much as it drops leaves.
- Leave the plant exactly where it is Once you can see buds, do not move the pot to a different room to admire it. Bud drop from a sudden change in light and temperature is very common.
- Start watering slightly more Increase to a light watering every three weeks or so while the buds swell. Do not go back to a summer schedule, and do not feed.
- Keep the flowers dry Water at the compost only. Water sitting on the flower clusters marks them and invites mold in a cool room.
- Cut the spent clusters off Once the flowers brown, snip the whole cluster back to the first leaf pair. Leaving them wastes the plant's reserves and traps damp.
- Resume normal care in spring After flowering, return to the spring routine: repot if needed, prune for shape, and start feeding at half strength once new growth is clearly moving.