Hi bought a large variegated jade plant last May. It seemed super healthy and beautiful when I bought it, but I've had a bunch of problems since then. First, I noticed little white cotton patches with tiny black bugs. I assumed they were mealy bugs. I've been fighting the infestation for months. First I was wiping them away but then I started to spay it with alcohol to try and kill the bugs. They always seemed to come back. The whole time leaves were drying up and falling off. They would end up looking little died out, crispy leaves that have been dryng in the sun for years. :/ I called the place I bought the plant and they said to try and wash off the soil and replant it. So I took it out of the pot and washed away as much of the soil as I could. I couldn't seem to remove the soil entangled in the roots but I rinsed it as much as possible. Since I repotted it, even more leaves are getting mushy and then drying off in little shrivelled leaves. All the stems feel firm but they are ALL drooping to the side instead of standing upright like when I first bought it. So many of the top leaves around the plant are drying up and falling off. Is there any way to save this plant? I'm so sad....usually I've done fine taking care of my plants and I'm so sad I've killed this once beautiful plant :(
Hi Rosalinda, sorry about your plant! You're right, that one pic of when it was healthy is amazing. That pot itself is really beautiful, but unfortunately terrible for a jade. Those glazed pots with the saucer attached have only one very tiny hole on the side and none on the bottom. This makes for extremely poor drainage and air exchange. It's very difficult to keep succulents in pots like these. An ideal pot might be something like an unglazed (this lets water evaporate quickly out the sides and reduces overwatering risk) clay pot with a free-draining soil mix. What type of soil do you have it in? Another problem I see is the decorative rocks on top the soil. They look great, but they slow evaporation from the soil surface and trap more water, increasing the chances of overwatering. To win the fight with the bugs, at every watering take the plant to the sink and blast all the bug hiding spaces with the kitchen sprayer. Hopefully your soil mix is free-draining enough to withstand being fully wetted and still dry out (down in the middle of the pot) in a week or two. If you're early in the bug fight and they still have sticky nests, you may need to use the sharp spray from the "flat" setting on a common 7-way hose-end garden nozzle. It will be a stronger (but still safe) bug blaster than your sink sprayer. Make sure to blast very well underneath the leaves. Try using a long bamboo skewer stick or similar to check way down at the bottom of the pot to see if it is still soaking wet down there. Wet soil will stick to the stick and darken it. What is light like for this one? Which way does that window face?
