Kerf bending Spekboom and other experiments with Portulacaria afra

[JoeWilson]

I’ve been getting somewhat obsessed with Spekboom, aka Dwarf Jade (P. Afra). I’ve watched what seems like countless videos and read who knows how many articles and forum posts about this plant, and there seems to be dozens of things that you're not allowed to do with it. You can’t water it more than once a month, you can’t fertilize it, you can’t use concave cutters, you can’t bend it, you can’t wire it, you can’t carve it. Is there anything you can do with Spekboom?

Then I read Andre Swart’s book Spekboom Bonsai Masterclass, and he says, paraphrasing of course, that in this plant’s native habitat, he ignores all of those can’t dos. Now, some of these may well apply if you’re growing them in Houston or Miami, but I live in semi-arid Denver, and my experience thus far has led me to think that I should ignore what most humid-climate dwellers say about this plant.

I have a handful of stick straight taperless trees in a pot that I’ve been chopping into cuttings. Let’s try some dumb stuff and see what happens. A while back, I noticed that Spekboom branches can break half off, reset into a new position, and be perfectly happy with their lot in life. This seems to go against common wisdom that any cut or damage will cause the branch to rot off. Let’s take that to the extreme and see if we can kerf bend them. For my first test, I made a half dozen cuts, about halfway through the trunk, and used a branch clamp to bend it. This resulted in one cut taking the majority of the strain and cracking pretty badly. Fewer cuts would probably work better.





The last photo is from tonight, a week later. The lower cuts that didn't spread much seem be healing over. The cut that took the force of the bend looks very dry.

Now, what do I think will happen? Well, the branch to the left might dry up and/or rot off. Some of the leaves are unhappy. I think more care needs to be taken to make sure I'm not severing the sap flow to branches directly above the cut. But I won’t be surprised if this survives and just looks goofy for a while.

I thought more about that half-broken branch and remembered that it had a clean break at the node. So my second test is cutting halfway through the node and bending it. I have a little more confidence that this will work and cause relatively minimal stress to three. I’ll be keeping an eye on these and will post updates in a few months or as soon as anything interesting happens. If this works out, I will try more severe bends.



Next up is a carving experiment. This little guy was developing inverse taper, and I wanted to do something about. So, a month or two ago, I took out my round knob cutters and went to town. Conventional wisdom tells that the trunk will rot out and the universe will implode. It’s fine so far, the cuts have dried out and callused over. The tree is healthy. New growth is sprouting right above the cut. It remains to be seen how well it heals over the long term, but I’m optimistic.



I’m very curious to hear if anyone else has success doing things with Spekboom that you’re not supposed to do. I have an infinite supply of cuttings and would like to try more wacky experiments to see what they can handle.

 

[JoeWilson]

Another thing I do that people will tell you not to. I stick Spekboom cuttings directly into the dirt. Sometimes in dedicated pots for cuttings, other times I jam them into or drop them onto the soil of the plant I’m trimming. I do not let them dry out or callous over. My success rate is very high, and they tend to root quickly. They only rot for me if I give them too much water or put them into the wrong kind of soil (too much/any organic material). 1:1 sand & perlite mix works great.

I think I may have the opposite risk that many others have, that the cuttings will dry out too quickly in my climate. Getting them in dirt quickly seems to alleviate this.

 

[hemmy]

They only rot for me if I give them too much water or put them into the wrong kind of soil (too much/any organic material). 1:1 sand & perlite mix works great.

My only failed large cuttings (2”+) were taken in the Fall in SoCal. The wet cool winter prevented any root growth and they rotted. But I would let larger diameter cuttings dry for a day to a few days and had no issue rooting in the Spring or Summer. I wouldn’t water until the leaves shriveled and I saw new growth. I’ve had large cuttings flower, I believe from the extreme drought. They can take plenty of water in a free draining mix during the periods of growth. I’ve wired to set shape and primary branches, but usually clip and grow after that. I fertilize them like anything else during the growing season.

For large wire bends, let them dry out and they get more flexible. It’s fine for them to separate at little at the segments, but I wouldn’t go past 1/4-1/3rd diameter. They don’t callous over wounds like a tree but heal more from the inside out. The below cascade was a single long branch that I bent and then grew the leader. I got the strong bend by using long parallel wire spines for support and then normal wiring around it.





Cheers

 

[Gaston]

Do you know littlejadebonsai (Instagram)? He's the best Portulacaria Afra grower and works wonders in very little time. He also gives advice from time to time. I can say with certainty that it's a species that really likes fertilizer; he uses Osmocote and Miracle Grow. Here's my jade plant that I've been working on from a cutting for about two years. I'm going to end up selling it because in winter, when I bring it inside, it loses quite a few leaves due to the heat from the stove. You're doing a great job! Portulacaria Afra is a very hardy species that can withstand rough treatment, haha.

 

[leatherback]

I’m very curious to hear if anyone else has success doing things with Spekboom that you’re not supposed to do. I have an infinite supply of cuttings and would like to try more wacky experiments to see what they can handle.

i feel most of the problems people have are because they water a dormant plant and it is cold. Cold wet dormant roots are a recipe for disaster. They spend most of the year outside here, and they do not care about weeks of rain in the growing season. I find the branches bend quite well. And as they are succulents, I am not surprised at al by your carving and breaking results.

 

[hemmy]

I'm going to end up selling it because in winter, when I bring it inside, it loses quite a few leaves due to the heat from the stove.

It seems like they also need strong artificial light inside otherwise mine have dropped leaves.

 

[leatherback]

It seems like they also need strong artificial light inside otherwise mine have dropped leaves.

I keep mine very cool (40-50F) and dry; Maybe twice in winter a tiny sip of water. When I water again properly as spring weather starts to pick up and they are moved into warmer quarters they pick up pace. Foliar density increases fast in spring.

 

[JoeWilson]

i feel most of the problems people have are because they water a dormant plant and it is cold. Cold wet dormant roots are a recipe for disaster. They spend most of the year outside here, and they do not care about weeks of rain in the growing season. I find the branches bend quite well. And as they are succulents, I am not surprised at al by your carving and breaking results.

Yes, and I feel like most people who have issues with rot after cutting are probably keeping the plants somewhere they get rained on, or maybe they are top watering. I only water the soil, and my P. afra are kept inside under bright grow lights. Humidity in the 30-50% range and temps of 65-75F. I only water when the soil is dry, in some of the smaller grow pots, that's once every 3-4 days. These are probably ideal conditions for cutting/carving, as the wounds dry out very quickly. I plan to move some of the bigger ones to a bench outside later in the year, but our winters are too cold to keep them out year-round (low of 5F tonight).

 

[JoeWilson]

My only failed large cuttings (2”+) were taken in the Fall in SoCal. The wet cool winter prevented any root growth and they rotted. But I would let larger diameter cuttings dry for a day to a few days and had no issue rooting in the Spring or Summer. I wouldn’t water until the leaves shriveled and I saw new growth. I’ve had large cuttings flower, I believe from the extreme drought. They can take plenty of water in a free draining mix during the periods of growth. I’ve wired to set shape and primary branches, but usually clip and grow after that. I fertilize them like anything else during the growing season.

For large wire bends, let them dry out and they get more flexible. It’s fine for them to separate at little at the segments, but I wouldn’t go past 1/4-1/3rd diameter. They don’t callous over wounds like a tree but heal more from the inside out. The below cascade was a single long branch that I bent and then grew the leader. I got the strong bend by using long parallel wire spines for support and then normal wiring around it.


View attachment 626717


Cheers

I'm curious about how deep a cut I can make at the node, so I may do some more experiments at different depths. I think that second cut test was about 40% in. I've read the advice about letting them dry out before wiring as well, and that makes sense. I need to pick one to torture and try it out.

 

[JoeWilson]

It seems like they also need strong artificial light inside otherwise mine have dropped leaves.

That's my experience as well. They don't mind the dry air, but they do need a lot of light. I recently doubled the amount of grow lights, and they love it.

 

[Vergil]

Joe, what did you think of the sprkboom masterclass book? Other than you going off on an ignore-everything-you've-ever-heard rampage, were there any good takeaways?

Separately, and I don't know if this is because I'm trying to root cuttings in the winter indoors, but the idea of not watering until you see new growth is not working for me. I put cuttings in dry soil and it just shrivels up and dies. No new growth. How long should it take for cuttings to show like they're growing?

 

[JoeWilson]

Joe, what did you think of the sprkboom masterclass book? Other than you going off on an ignore-everything-you've-ever-heard rampage, were there any good takeaways?

Separately, and I don't know if this is because I'm trying to root cuttings in the winter indoors, but the idea of not watering until you see new growth is not working for me. I put cuttings in dry soil and it just shrivels up and dies. No new growth. How long should it take for cuttings to show like they're growing?

I really enjoyed the book. It’s filled with great information, cover to cover. Growing/care, styling, etc. I really appreciate how he talks about where these plants are from and what they want to do naturally, and relates that to how to effectively style them. This has gotten me to think more about African styling for some of my other arid climate plants.

As for cuttings, I typically see root growth in 3-6 weeks. After two months, I sometimes cuttings with roots up to 5” long. I do not put cuttings into completely dry soil. If your humidity is high, that might work. However, in my experience, the soil should remain very slightly moist; drying out from time to time is okay, but I haven’t had much luck rooting without moisture. Especially with smaller cuttings, they dry out too fast here. Bigger cuttings have more water reserves, so you might want to treat them a little differently, I usually keep small and large cutings in different trays.

Consider watering very lightly when you put the soil in the pot and misting occasionally to keep it moist. Stick a finger in once a week to see how it’s doing. If you end up over-watering (ie: it feels sopping wet, or there is standing water at the bottom of the tray), pull everything out and put it into a fresh pot and let the cuttings dry out for a few days or a week before watering or moistening the new soil.

Sometimes the cuttings will get very dry and make it, sometimes they’ll die off. Usually this happens when they’re in a corner of the tray that didn’t get any/enough water. Often, when a cutting rots, it’s only the bottom one or two nodes, and you can break them off and try again. I'll do that if it's a promising cutting, but otherwise I'll toss 'em.

I (mostly) use $2 Ikea trays that do not have drainage holes. You can use trays/grow pots that have holes, and it will be more difficult to overwater them, but you may need to check on the moisture level more frequently. I cram cuttings tight into the trays, about 1” apart. I try to move them before the roots get too established, as they can be hard to break up. For small cuttings, I move them to 2.5” plastic pots, 4 in each pot. For medium cuttings, I’ll put maybe 1 or 2 in those pots. And larger cuttings (1/2” trunk or more) usually go directly into a small 6.5” plastic bonsai grow pot. After the roots get more established in the 2.5” pots, I move them on to the 6.5” pots as well.

The cuttings stay next to the grow light station, close enough that they get some light, but not so close that they get blasted. Once they have roots and are in a pot, they go under the lights and get watered/fertilized the same as the more established plants.

I’m propagating a few other types of plants with the same method, and only vary how much water they get. You’ll get a feel for the right moisture level after a while. There are a lot of people on here who have been growing these for much longer than me, so take this all with a grain of salt. But it’s what has worked in my climate.

PS: I’m doing some experiments with very small cuttings, like 1 or 2 nodes from a trunk or thick branch. I’ll report back if any of these work.

 

[milehigh_7]

I’ve been getting somewhat obsessed with Spekboom, aka Dwarf Jade (P. Afra). I’ve watched what seems like countless videos and read who knows how many articles and forum posts about this plant, and there seems to be dozens of things that you're not allowed to do with it. You can’t water it more than once a month, you can’t fertilize it, you can’t use concave cutters, you can’t bend it, you can’t wire it, you can’t carve it. Is there anything you can do with Spekboom?

Then I read Andre Swart’s book Spekboom Bonsai Masterclass, and he says, paraphrasing of course, that in this plant’s native habitat, he ignores all of those can’t dos. Now, some of these may well apply if you’re growing them in Houston or Miami, but I live in semi-arid Denver, and my experience thus far has led me to think that I should ignore what most humid-climate dwellers say about this plant.

I have a handful of stick straight taperless trees in a pot that I’ve been chopping into cuttings. Let’s try some dumb stuff and see what happens. A while back, I noticed that Spekboom branches can break half off, reset into a new position, and be perfectly happy with their lot in life. This seems to go against common wisdom that any cut or damage will cause the branch to rot off. Let’s take that to the extreme and see if we can kerf bend them. For my first test, I made a half dozen cuts, about halfway through the trunk, and used a branch clamp to bend it. This resulted in one cut taking the majority of the strain and cracking pretty badly. Fewer cuts would probably work better.





The last photo is from tonight, a week later. The lower cuts that didn't spread much seem be healing over. The cut that took the force of the bend looks very dry.

Now, what do I think will happen? Well, the branch to the left might dry up and/or rot off. Some of the leaves are unhappy. I think more care needs to be taken to make sure I'm not severing the sap flow to branches directly above the cut. But I won’t be surprised if this survives and just looks goofy for a while.

I thought more about that half-broken branch and remembered that it had a clean break at the node. So my second test is cutting halfway through the node and bending it. I have a little more confidence that this will work and cause relatively minimal stress to three. I’ll be keeping an eye on these and will post updates in a few months or as soon as anything interesting happens. If this works out, I will try more severe bends.



Next up is a carving experiment. This little guy was developing inverse taper, and I wanted to do something about. So, a month or two ago, I took out my round knob cutters and went to town. Conventional wisdom tells that the trunk will rot out and the universe will implode. It’s fine so far, the cuts have dried out and callused over. The tree is healthy. New growth is sprouting right above the cut. It remains to be seen how well it heals over the long term, but I’m optimistic.



I’m very curious to hear if anyone else has success doing things with Spekboom that you’re not supposed to do. I have an infinite supply of cuttings and would like to try more wacky experiments to see what they can handle.

It seems there are many myths regarding Ports... #1 "You can’t water it more than once a month". The fact? It 100% depends on the ambient temp. When temps are over 100F I water at least daily. They love water and will grow like weeds. #2) "you can’t fertilize it" Fact: They are relatively heavy feeders if you want them to grow fast. Mine constantly have Osmocote Plus year round plus "Old Blue " Miracle Gro every few weeks during the growing season... #3 can't use concave cutters... see the attached image of a trunk scar from 1 year ago on this little cutting. I mean it's not gonna roll over but it depends on what you want. If you want fine radial roots to pop from your cutting, try talc based rooting hormone when freshly cut. I've also included pics of a pot of 'Frank' that is only was only two small cuttings two years ago (with a random elm hardwood cutting just suck in because I didn't have anywhere else to put it at the time. The pot is about 2 feet tall for reference. Also a pot of my cork bark 'Lilliput' that went from 1/4" plants in a 2" pot to some branches that are well over 1" in diameter in 2 years this plant spreads out over 3 feet...

 

[Vergil]

As for cuttings, I typically see root growth in 3-6 weeks. After two months, I sometimes cuttings with roots up to 5” long. I do not put cuttings into completely dry soil.

Thanks for the response. I guess add to all the conflicting information (which may very well be completely true) is that they root in response to conditions being dry (grow roots to seek water further away). I'll try some limited moisture on mine.

 

[moke]

I’ve never told any of my trees the rules; I water them every day, sometimes every other day, depending on what the leaves tell me. I fertilize every month, Grow More 20 20 20 3 tsps per gallon, and I used concave cutters yesterday.
I’ve bent them, though not with a bender like you used, which would be asking for a joint split. I use wire and slowly bend it over time, letting the tree recover between slight bends until the bend I desire is achieved. I pay no attention to humidity. I have a dehumidifier in the area of my basement that maintains an average of 45%. I live in Utah and have them indoors until the temperatures allow them to go outside. I actually see the best and most compact growth indoors under lights. I’ve always grown mine out in fabric pots until the tree is basically to a final design, then it goes to a bonsai pot.

 

[Vergil]

I’ve never told any of my trees the rules

View attachment 626767

Beautiful tree! I guess ignorance is bliss...

 

[JoeWilson]

I’ve never told any of my trees the rules; I water them every day, sometimes every other day, depending on what the leaves tell me. I fertilize every month, Grow More 20 20 20 3 tsps per gallon, and I used concave cutters yesterday.
I’ve bent them, though not with a bender like you used, which would be asking for a joint split. I use wire and slowly bend it over time, letting the tree recover between slight bends until the bend I desire is achieved. I pay no attention to humidity. I have a dehumidifier in the area of my basement that maintains an average of 45%. I live in Utah and have them indoors until the temperatures allow them to go outside. I actually see the best and most compact growth indoors under lights. I’ve always grown mine out in fabric pots until the tree is basically to a final design, then it goes to a bonsai pot.

View attachment 626767

Great tree! I'm encouraged by what you say about indoor growing. I was seeing vigorous growth with my setup, but long nodes (1/2-1"), so I added extra lights. This seems to have helped; I'm seeing smaller leaves/nodes now. But I haven't had the new lights for long, so we'll see.

I wanted to try the branch clamps because everyone says they will snap if you bend them too much. That's true, of course, but I wanted to see just how much force it took and when you go a little too far, how bad does it get/how well does it heal. You can hear it start to give and back off a little. You can probably ratchet it up slowly over time, but I haven't tested that much yet. Now I'm curious how far I could push it with a clamp after letting one dry out.

 

[Weta]

Moss been in this pot for years, gets a repot next spring. Needs bug attention.