Want to know how to make a bushy jade plant? Maybe your plant has become long due to neglect or poor care, or maybe you only have one stem plant and you want it to be branched and beautiful and full.
In this article, I will show you step by step through photos how easy it really is to encourage your jade plant to become a beautiful complete specimen! It’s surprisingly easy to do. The process literally only takes a few minutes, then you just have to wait for your plant to grow to see the results.
HOW TO MAKE A BUSHY JADE PLANT
Why would you want to prune a jade plant? The reasons for this are many and include:
- To control the size of your installation.
- To encourage your plant to grow more branches and become more complete.
- To create a more stable, stronger and more compact plant.
And while you’re at it… can you use the cuttings you cut for propagation if you want to plant more.
Whether you have the old jade plant (Crassula ovata) or a variety like Jade Gollum, you can prune your plant in the same way.
Here is my Jade Gollum that I pulled from a cutting. You can see that it started to develop well and even branched on its own before I even did anything with it.
After it continued to grow, I wanted to prune it so that it would branch out and form a more complete plant. It is enough to select an area where your plant should branch and cut it.
For example, look at the photo below. Prune each branch just a little above a row of leaves (where the red line is). Wherever you cut it, new branches will form just below this point.
I pruned this plant when it was a little older than the photo above, but the concept is exactly the same.
Look what happened after only a few weeks of cutting. From each of the three branches that I pruned, two new branches grew, a total of 6 new branches.
Here is an example:
And the same new branches, after growing a little more:
After a few months from the first cut, the plant looks like this:
It may seem a little sparse, but it has branched out beautifully, and when it grows up, it will be full and beautiful.
PRUNING A LONG-LEGGED JADE PLANT
If you have a jade plant that has become long and has lost a lot of lower leaves, you can always prune your plant.
Here’s how, and I’ll demonstrate with a photo of another of my jade plants (this time the old simple species, Crassula ovata).
If you look carefully at the photo below, you will see rings around the stems. These are leaf scars, where there were leaves earlier.
You can simply prune directly above a leaf scar (maybe a quarter of an inch above… do not cut them too close to the leaf scar). Remember that new branches (usually 2 of each size) form just below the place where you pruned.
I slightly pruned (and also repotted this strongly rooted Jade).
Look at the Transformation after less than a year.
Tips for cutting your Jade
- Step back and look at your jade plant. Know that wherever you prune it, you will get more branches, so visualize where you want new branches to grow. It is also an art!
- Use a clean, sterilized knife or a set of secateurs. Here are the secateurs that I like to use (link to Amazon). You can prune your plant quite hard, but don’t be too crazy. You can safely prune up to 1/3 of the plant or more.
- Usually, you get two new branches that form just below the place where you are pruning.
- And if you want to plant more, you can multiply your Jade cuttings.
- After pruning your plant, make sure that you give your plant enough light and good growing conditions. Jade plants grown in low light are long, so make a good start for your freshly pruned plant. Check out my blog post on Jade Plant Care for more details.
And once you have pruned your Jade, you can use what you have pruned to propagate new plants. Did you know that you can not only grow jade plants from cuttings but also propagate Jade with individual leaves?
I hope you liked this post on how to make a bushy jade plant. It’s really easy and with time and patience, you can easily get a beautiful full jade plant.
