If you are planning to grow Gollum jade. You need to read the below Gollum jade plant care guide before growing the plant. Gollum jade is a succulent plant and succulents are easy to grow indoors as well as outdoors.
Gollum jade is also known as hobbit jade or crassula ovata. If you give it proper sunlight, water, and humidity. It will achieve its full 3 feet height. You will be surprised to see the color that it gains under full light.
Without wasting time let’s find out what is Gollum jade and how to grow it indoors in containers.
Let’s start
Quick care guide
| Common Names | Crassula ovata Gollum, Gollum jade, Trumpet jade |
| Height | 3 feet |
| Spread | 2 feet |
| Light | Full sun |
| Water | Moderate |
| Soil | Cactus potting soil |
| Fertilizer | Weak fertilizer |
| Flowers | White (rarely bloom) |
| Pests & Diseases | Mealybugs, Spider mites & Root rot |
| Propagation | From stem cutting and Leaf |
About the plant
The Gollum jade plant is a succulent plant and is a member of the jade plant family. There are many types of jade plants. Most of them have the same growing and caring needs. Gallium jade grows up to 3 feet tall with even widespread. It has 2 inches long pipe-shaped leaves with reddish-pink tips.
Like other jade plants its leaves are filled with water. This plant only blooms under ideal growing conditions. When it blooms it produces beautiful star-shaped white color flowers. In 80% of the cases, indoor growing jade plants never bloom in their life.
But people like to grow Gollum jade for its leaves, not for the flowers. Flowers are the reward by the plant to its growers for its proper care.
It is a slow-growing plant but achieves its maximum height within 2 years. Repot it on time to speed up its growth. Hobbit jade plant spread a maximum of 2 feet when it gets fully matured.
Growing Gollum jade plant
As I said earlier, almost all jade plants need the same amount of light, water, humidity, and fertilizers to grow. The main thing they need to grow is light. Give proper light to the Gollum plant and it will give you colorful tubular leaves.
Plant it in organic-rich soil, give moderate water for shining leaves.
There are many things that you need to take care of while growing succulents. Jade plants do need care like other plants. Follow the below guide if your Gollum jade plant is not showing good growth.
If it is suffering from any disease then jump to the last section of this article.
Light
Crassula Ovata “Hobbit jade plant” can tolerate full sun. In fact, when you put plants in full sun it shows brilliant growth. The dark green leaves become lime-green and the red tips become extra bright and beautiful.
The indoor growing jade plant needs a minimum of 4 to 6 hours of direct sunlight. Put the plant on the sunny windowsill to give it a good amount of natural light.
Some people do not have sunny windows. In this case, you can take the help of grow light.
These lights emit light waves similar to the sun. The plants cannot differentiate between artificial light and sunlight.
As long as they receive the light waves similar to the sun rays, they keep growing.
Always use LED grow lights because this lighting technology uses less electric current than others. Also, you don’t have to spend money on the maintenance of LEDs because they have zero maintenance costs.
Moreover, they have more than 100,000 hours of life span.
You can move your indoor hobbit jade plant to outdoors at any time of the year. Just remember that you have to slowly increase the outdoor time of a plant.
For example, on the first day put it outdoors for 4 hours then gradually increase the time by adding 1 extra hour each day.
Soil
For the best possible growth use the best cactus potting soil for Gollum jade plant care. Succulent does not need heavy watering. They are more prone to root rot like diseases. Therefore, you need to use the soil that drains extra water quickly.
Cactus potting soil is well-draining soil and you don’t need to add anything to it. It already has good aeration properties too.
If the soil you are going to use is old then you have to add perlite to make it suitable for the plant. Add a hand full of perlite in a medium-size pot.
The best soil mixture for growing crassula ovata Gollum is a handful of coarse sand in cactus soil.
If you are new to the houseplant then do not take risk of making soil at home. Buy a small bag of succulent potting soil from the local garden store.
Because the incorrect ingredients in the soil can kill the plant.
Temperature
The good news is Gollum jade can tolerate mild frost. This means they can survive easily if the temperature drops to – 4 degrees C.
The ideal temperature range for the hobbit jade is 7 Degrees C to 29 Degrees C. In this temperature range your Gollum plant may produce flowers. But below or above this range the plant will not bloom. They just stand healthy.
If you are living in the hardiness zones 9-10 then you can grow this plant outdoors. The environment in these zones is suitable for the plant. You can leave the plant outdoor for an entire year and it will not die.
The problem comes in other zones. Some of them are hot for this plant others are too cold. In these hardiness zones, the Gollum plant should be grown in pots.
It is easy to move pots outside when the temperature is in the ideal range. Move the pot inside when the plant feels uncomfortable in outdoors weather.
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Water
For the best possible Gollum jade plant care, water the plants regularly in spring and summer. Then cut backwater in fall. Give light water on winter days.
On hot days of summer, my routine is watering jade plants 4 times a week. Because I live in a hot climate zone. You may need to water it less or more depending on the day temperature of your area.
The best way to water succulents is to check the soil conditions first. Insert the fingertip in the potting soil if the soil is moistened do not water.
The upper 3 inches of soil has to be completely dry before watering the jade plant.
Remember that excess water can cause root rot. Saving a small plant from root fungus is a hard job. In 80% of the cases, the plant dies due to root fungus.
In winters, water the plant infrequently, just once a month.
Use filtered clean water for watering succulents.
The golden rule says the water that is suitable for drinking is always good for watering plants.
Fertilizer
We give fertilizers to the plant to help them to produce flowers. A plant spent 80% of its energy to produce flowers. So, they need a little extra boost of nutrients in the form of fertilizers.
For Gollum jade plant care, fertilize it in the spring and summer. This is its active stage means its growing phase.
Use a weak mixture of succulent food and give it to the plants. Only use liquid fertilizers for the container growing jade plants. Fertilize Gollum jade once every 2 weeks.
Remember that giving a high dosage of fertilizer will not increase the chances of bloom. In fact, it is called over-fertilization. Excess nutrients are deadly conditions for small plants.
Humidity
As I said, if your garden is in Hardiness zones 9-10 then you don’t need to worry about the humidity. Whereas in other zones the humidity might be the issue. Therefore, you should grow it in containers. Because the humidity inside our homes is good for Gollum jade.
You can grow any type of jade plant indoors in containers. You don’t need to buy a plant humidifier or need any pebble tray method.
Humidity is highly concerned in the case of growing tropical rain forest plants. Growing Succulents can survive in low to moderately high humidity.
High humidity and excess water are not good for hobbit Gollum plants.
Jade plant Propagation
Here you have two options one is propagated jade plant from a stem or the second is from leaves.
Propagate it from stem cuttings
First of all, take a healthy disease-free stem cutting of a healthy Gollum jade plant. It should be 3 inches long with at least two leaves.
Remove the extra leaves from the base.
Prepare a starting mixture by using 40 % cactus soil, 40% perlite, and 40 % sand.
Now plant the stem upright in the pot like a tree. Give some water to keep the soil moist.
Put the pot in a warm location under indirect bright light.
Keep the soil moist all the time. After 2 weeks touch the stem cutting to check if it is established or not.
If the cutting develops roots it stands firmly, this means your work is successful. Your cutting is now growing and turns into a beautiful flower plant shortly.
Propagating from leaf
Look for the healthy leaves and pull 3 to 4 leaves even if you want only one plant. Because not every leaf of a plant can develops roots. Some weak leaves decompose due to illness.
In the next step dip the leaf base in rooting hormone. These hormones increase the success rate of developing roots.
Now put the plant on the potting soil that is mentioned in the stem cutting process.
Mist some water on the leaves (do not burry them or sprinkle soil or anything on them).
Put the pot in a warm location under bright light (not direct light).
After 2 weeks the leaves develop roots and you will see a little plant is coming out of it.
Note: The success rate of stem cutting propagation is 70% more than the leave propagation method.
Jade plant pests and diseases
Under normal growing conditions the crassula ovata Gollum does not get infected by any disease or pets. But mealybugs and spider mites are the two-common type of pets that may attack the plant. They only attack those plants that are in contact with other infected plants. Or you do not care about your plant properly, in short, you put them in a dusty place.
Use neem oil to kill the pests and also to prevent them in the future.
This oil does not harm plants in any way. You can use it in advance on plants to prevent such bugs. Buy a small bottle of it and use it once a month.
Root rot might be the big problem if you water them excessively. Under good water conditions, the plant does not get any fungus disease.
When you next time water your plants check the soil before watering.
