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An Heirloom Jade Plant

A couple of months ago I stumbled upon this beautiful picture of an indoor plant.

a big potted jade plant
This is a jade plant. According to the owner it’s over 70 years old.

According to the owner it’s a picture of an heirloom plant and it’s over 70 years old. The discussion confirmed that it’s Crassula ovata commonly known as jade plant. The picture is truly inspiring so I decided to grow my own.

Today, I got my very own jade plant.

jade plant potted in a grow bag
I bought her for ₱50 in kiosk in SM Lucena

When I got home. I proceeded to repot this beauty.

jade plant with the grow bag removed showing a loamy soil
She seems to have been propagated from that big leaf sticking out of the soil.

The soil is loamy and still pretty moist. It’s all caked up and forms a large clump. I did my best to remove most of it an expose the root ball.

jade plant with exposed roots
Here she is with most of the soil removed.

I decided to use this aged clay pot for her:

an aged clay pot with a slight patina
An aged clay pot with a slight patina.
pot with large holes with a fine plastic mesh over them
A piece of plastic fine mesh added to keep the potting media from leaking through those large drain holes.

Pot has previously held a florist kalanchoe which has since been moved to a bigger pot. I added a piece of plastic screen because this pot has pretty large drainage holes as you can see in the picture.

a potted jade plant
Jade plant finally potted.

I used my own mix for her. It’s the leftover mineral soil for my cacti. I just added more compost and carbonized rice hull.

profile picture of a potted jade plant
Jade plant finally sitting in her new home.

I skipped watering for now to allow her to adjust to her new pot and potting media. I placed her on a shady spot for now. I will introduce her to more light in the following days so she can slowly adjust. Hopefully this is day one of her 70 year journey. Wish me luck!