36 Things: Propagate Sedums

OK, I had to give myself one or two easy things in my list of 36 Things I Want to Do Before I Turn 37 and transplanting sedums has been something I have been meaning to do for years.

As you can see, I am not very good at thinning out my succulents and keeping them pretty.
The only thing I that kept me from doing this sooner was a) the weather and b) the belief that I needed special soil or something to activate the roots on the sedums when I transplanted them.


Well, I went down to Gardensphere (The are the same people that helped with our backyard garden design) and they set me straight. Being succulents, they just need a lot of drainage. I was told I could just take my normal compost mulch and mix it 50/50 with sand and I would be ready to go. I made it even fancier by adding some pearlite as well.

I divided the soil out into small 4" pots. I always save nursery pots, I own about 200 of them!

Then I carefully separated the "chicks" from the "hens" and pulled out other random sedums from all over the front yard. I have so many in our rock wall, I probably could have filled all 200 pots and then started a sedum selling business.

These look very alien to me, but in a good way.
It's interesting how the roots are almost as large as the plants.

Then I carefully set them in the pots and covered their little roots with more soil and watered them well. Now I just need to wait and let them do their thing. I am planning on giving these away as gifts at my garden dinner party for 20.