How to Grow Succulents? 20 Super Practical Care Tips to Help You Grow Succulents Well

Editor / Succulent Plant Hub

Growing succulents in midsummer is not easy, so cherish every moment. Even in summer, many succulent lovers' enthusiasm remains undiminished, and the Editor-in-Chief often receives various summer problems from succulent lovers.

Actually, experience posts on summering have been published one after another since before early summer. You can reply "Summering" in the official account to view related posts. Today, the Editor-in-Chief has gathered 20 small care tips from the internet, hoping to provide you with a little help.

1. Sunlight is the best fertilizer for succulents, there is no doubt about this. Basically, those Crassulaceae succulents in good condition are all sunned into their state. But succulents that have not been grown outdoors long-term cannot suddenly accept strong sunlight, otherwise they are easily sunburned and need to gradually adapt to the environment.

2. The five situations summarized by experts in the community that should avoid exposure to strong sun during summering:

①Do not expose to sun if the root system is poor: For succulents in the rooting stage or the pot-adjusting stage, special attention must be paid to shading during summering. In a strongly sunlit environment, the roots often cannot continuously supply water, and once exposed to strong sun they will be severely sunburned.

②Do not expose to sun if the soil is too dry: When the soil lacks water, even if the succulent's root system is good, once the water supply is lacking, it loses the protective ability of self-cooling. Strong sun exposure also very easily causes sunburn.

③Do not expose to sun if the soil is too wet: With especially wet soil, the succulent's roots cannot breathe, causing both self-repair ability and water absorption ability to deteriorate. If exposed to strong sun at this time, it easily causes the roots to be cooked in hot water.

④Do not expose to sun if the succulent is leggy: A leggy succulent, whether stems or leaves, is full of water and puffed up. If suddenly exposed to strong sun, the epidermal cells find it hard to resist the sudden intense light, and it is very easily sunburned. It is best to increase light gradually.

⑤Do not expose to sun if the air is hot and humid: Highly humid air slows the succulent's transpiration, causing it to lose part of its heat-dissipation function. Succulents are very unaccustomed to the weather of sudden clearing after summer rain and are especially prone to sunburn. It is best to shade the succulents before the sky clears. If conditions permit, you can also turn on a fan to blow air, which helps ventilation.

3. High temperature, not high humidity; high humidity, not high temperature. Many cases of succulent black rot confirm this saying. The best time to water in summer is at sunset in the evening. Choose to water when the next day is cloudy and the temperature is not high. It is best to use the soaking method and not soak thoroughly. After a night of air-drying, the risk can be reduced to the minimum.

4. Ventilation is a very important and absolutely necessary condition for growing succulents, bar none. During the yellow plum rainy season, ventilation must be strengthened, for example by adding two electric fans.

Several ventilation conditions: Outdoor flower racks are excellent level. Opening windows indoors on a balcony is good level; bay windows (because high-floor windows cannot be fully opened, everyone can understand, right?) are fair level; so if you have a sufficiently large flower rack, it is still best to put all the succulents outside.

5. There are likewise many materials that can be used as succulent plant growing medium. The simplest soil mix is peat + perlite. (But peat needs some processing, which is inconvenient.); although buying ready-made soil is simpler, the price is really quite expensive, and once the quantity increases it is also a considerable expense.

6. Be sure not to dig up local soil. When wet it is not breathable, and when dry it easily hardens, which is very unfavorable to the roots. It is recommended to use a special soil with good breathability; at the same time, do not choose sharply angular materials as top dressing stones. After heavy watering, the leaves become plump and can be scratched, turn to mush, and even cause black rot, which is commonly seen.

7. In greenhouses the humidity is high, and succulent leaf pores open to absorb water and stay alive, so the demand for soil is not high. But for home growing, especially outdoor growing, choosing soil mixed with a certain proportion of granular soil to retain water and nourish roots is not wrong. Pure peat or coconut husk soil dries out too easily and is not very suitable for outdoor growing.

8. Do not believe in all kinds of fancy, miraculous soils. Even if it is only for aesthetics, the top dressing must still be akadama, kanuma, and the like. Odd and weird materials can be used, but "coffee beans, tea grounds, okara, distillers' grains" as top dressing, do not joke around.

9. Putting something at the bottom of the pot is also necessary. Ceramsite is good and comes in many specifications, but comparatively, the limestone seen everywhere on construction sites, or stones, are not even cheaper? After placing it at the bottom, remember to add a layer of fiber cloth to prevent soil and water loss. It is really very useful.

10. It is recommended to choose a pot larger than the spread of the succulent's leaves. The benefits of doing so are: first, a large pot gives the roots ample space to develop, which is good for growth; second, a large pot surface is good for ventilation and reduces the chance of black rot; third, there is no need to frequently repot and damage the roots.

About Care

11. You need to understand the habits of succulents. Many succulents are summer-dormant types. During the dormant period, just place them in a cool, ventilated place with little water. Bringing them indoors in winter and shading them in summer, leggy growth and spreading out are not frightening. After normal outdoor growing in spring and autumn, they still recover very quickly. In summer and winter, if you want to avoid leggy growth under weak light, the only way is to cut water and let them go dormant. After dormancy, growth stops.

12. It is best not to grow seedlings outdoors, because the root system is not developed enough. Outdoors, air-drying and rapid soil moisture loss lead to slow growth, and in addition, strong sun, heavy rain, and other severe weather can all cause death.

14. Freshly beheaded succulents must be dried in a cool, ventilated place before being potted in moist soil to root. Generally they are dried for about a week. The same applies to freshly plucked leaves, which generally need to be dried for several days. This can reduce the rate of turning to mush, and after watering they are also less likely to mold.

15. After potting, for a period of time the lower leaves of the succulent will wither. If the withering is gradual, then it is an intuitive sign of adjusting to the pot. Wait until the leaves stretch out. The growing point regains vitality. Then the succulent has adapted. The process of adjusting to the pot is the process of the succulent taking root and growing.

16. Entering summer, it is best not to buy succulents online, especially rootless succulents, because many succulents in dormancy do not easily produce roots. Newly potted succulents cannot accept strong sunlight. Place them in a cool, ventilated place with little water, let them root well, and then gradually move them to normal care.

17. If the price difference is not too large, it is still recommended as much as possible to buy succulents from local greenhouses or markets, reducing the risk of poor pot adjustment and rooting and the process of re-rooting. Succulents brought home from a greenhouse or market still in their pots are best repotted or soaked with insecticide, because they may contain insects or eggs.

18. Do not blindly buy large old stumps. In fact, after the ordeal of express delivery, old stumps are far from as sturdy as you imagine, and problems very easily arise during pot adjustment.

19. Do not be fooled by the dazzling names of Korean goods. Many varieties are actually common domestic ones. Do not blindly chase and buy expensive goods and expensive leaves. After round after round of hype, varieties whose prices fall are everywhere.

Especially for inexperienced beginners, leaf cuttings are more like walking a tightrope. There are too many factors that cause leaf cuttings to turn to mush. Moreover, regardless of success or failure, determining whether a leaf is true to type from just one leaf is not easy to do.

20. Accept succulents with black rot with a calm mind. You should know that we all walk forward stepping on one blackened succulent after another. Even veterans inevitably sometimes fail and kill expensive succulents.

When you find that leaves have turned to mush, pluck them off in time to avoid spread. If the stem has blackened, decisively cut it off, preserving the intact head and leaves as much as possible to continue its life.