Clever Succulent Cuttings: Use a Vegetable Washing Basket and a Plastic Bottle for Easy Rooting and a High Survival Rate
When taking succulent cuttings, it is basically a fifty-fifty situation. Some leaves only grow roots, while sometimes even when they shrivel up they are still just a single leaf. Too dry and they will not root, too damp and the leaves rot away! How come other people's succulent cuttings are just so easy! If your succulent cuttings have a low survival rate, you might as well try these two methods!
1. Rooting in a Plastic Bottle
This method is mainly to improve the moisture problem during the cutting process. With this method you do not need to spray water often, and the succulent roots will grow strong and long.
First prepare a plastic bottle, an ordinary drinking water bottle will do. Cut off both the top and the bottom. At the same time, also prepare the flower pot, soil and expanded clay pellets (ceramsite) to be used for the cuttings.
Spread about 2 cm of expanded clay pellets on the bottom, then insert the bottle, then cover with ordinary cutting soil and you are done! Just place the leaves on top.
When watering normally, just pour water into the bottle. The soil will stay moist the whole time. If you choose a slightly larger container, you can place one in each of the diagonally opposite positions for an even better effect!
2. Vegetable Washing Basket
It is this kind, but check that the holes must be a bit smaller. Prepare slightly larger-particle vermiculite, peat soil and coconut coir, mix them evenly, and put them into the basket. Then place the succulent leaves on the surface. Then place the whole basket in a tray filled with water; the water in the tray should be about 1-2 cm deep. When the water runs low, just top it up promptly.
Actually this is not some particularly profound principle. Set up this way, it can increase the soil's air permeability, so it is not easy to accumulate water, and of course not easy to lack water either. Generally, in two weeks they will definitely root, and may even grow leaves!