Houseplant - Crassula ovata (jade plant)

As winter approaches, I've been trying to figure out what I'm going to post about.  I can always talk about garden planning and plants I fancy, and there will be seasonal topics such as evergreens and weather to discuss.  As I was compiling a list of such topics, it hit me:

Houseplant Thursdays 

I guess it doesn't quite roll off the tongue like Wordless Wednesdays. 

These days, I have quite a few houseplants and I would like to learn more about them and share what I've learned.

First things first - is it house plant or houseplant?  Wikipedia seems to like houseplant, so that is what I'll use.  Next, should I use scientific names or common names?  For some reason, I only refer to houseplants by their common names.  I'll be looking up the scientific names and including them in each post title, but I doubt I will ever think of a jade plant as crassula ovata (or even just crassula).

Speaking of which - our first houseplant is the jade plant (or crassula ovata, or sometimes even crassula argentea).

Jade Plant (and Andy, our one-eyed cat)

One of my earliest "gardening" memories is picking leaves off my mother's jade plant and putting them in the dirt to make new plants.   It seems like we always had a jade plant when I was a kid.  They're a really easy to care for, low maintenance plant.

Mine does well in a sunny window with minimal watering and well-drained "cactus" soil.

The biggest thing to watch out for with jade plants is overwatering.  In the past, I have killed jade plants by overwatering them, mistaking their crinkled leaves as a symptom of a thirsty plant.  According to wikipedia, you should water them every 10-20 days in the summer and only every 30 days in winter.  I probably water mine every two weeks. 



Beautiful red-tinged, succulent foliage

This is my first attempt at keeping a jade plant since I had to surrender our last one to my mother-in-law for safe-keeping.  I purchased it from Home Depot in the Fall of 2010 and so far, it's done really well.  It spent the summer on the back deck and seemed to flourish.  We'll see how it survives another winter indoors.