Why I Oughta...

In late January, I tried a succulent propagation experiment with one variable:  cutting vs callus'd-over pieces of Burro's Tail.  I used rooting compound and went about planting two small containers of little pieces of succulent.  In the green, plastic container, I planted segments that I sliced in-to and then applied the rooting compound.  In the clay pot, I left the segments with their calluses and just rubbed rooting compound on the surface.  The little white post-it note says:  "Uncut = Clay".  (I keep an offline garden diary of sorts, too...) Four-or-so-weeks later, here's what those two containers look like: What has happened?  The cuttings on the left - the ones that I sliced into with a knife BEFORE applying the rooting compound have just melted away.  On the right - the ones that I left intact?  Many of them are still there and doing just fine.   Lesson learned:  when propagating succulents, make sure they have completely callused over before attempting

Last week, I started my Winter propagation journey with a new bottle of Rooting Powder and talked about how I was planning on taking up some projects including using some cuttings (or, frankly...more like 'fallings' - because they just fall off the plant) of Burro's Tail and our Christmas Cactus.  I've had success with lazy propagation with my Burro's Tail over the years, but that was at my office on the 64th floor.  This post and photo from 2018 show a good look at the mother plant, a set of soil-rooted babies and a clear cup of water-rooted cuttings.   I have a series of pieces of this succulent that we've had laying in pots/containers for a number of months, but haven't really been dedicated to getting them to root and was mostly just leaving it to 'hope' that they'd take off.  So, I went off to YouTube to figure out what the *right* way to propagate these are - in soil or in water.  I learned that you should (ideally) allow the cutting to