I can't be of too much help here. I don't root adenium cuttings because I grow the species for the caudex. Cutting don't develop a caudex. I have rooted a number of adenium plants so they are basically treated like other cuttings. The soil is never watered per se, but a hose end 2 gpm mist head is used every few days to raise humidity on the top of the soil. Most of the foliage is removed. Rooted this plant a few months ago. randy

In zone 8 North Carolina, 'Celeste' should be perfectly hardy for you. The first winter or two it probably wasn't well-established yet; and despite how warm it was this past December and January, February was pretty cold and the unusually late hard freeze may have set it back again. I would suggest it simply needs another year or two to get established--my own fig died to the roots after its first two winters but now that it has been in the ground a few years, it took single digits this past winter with very little damage. I see plenty of large figs around Washington, DC (zone 7a/b) and the established ones rarely suffer much damage, even after a cold winter.

To help you figure things out ...... if you're watering when you can still detect moisture in the soil with a finger, you can't be under-watering. If you can eliminate under-watering based on the above, it pretty much leaves you with over-watering or a high level of dissolved solids in the soil from the fertilizer you applied. What did you use for fertilizer, how much did you use, and how did you apply it? Was the plant dry at application time? I don't know if I mentioned this, but it's easy to monitor soil moisture levels with a 'tell'. A wood dowel (from any hardware or home improvement store) about 5/16" in diameter works best. They come 48" long. Cut it in half & sharpen all 4 ends in a pencil sharpener. Push it deep into the soil and don't water until the first day it comes out clean/dry. Did you read the thread I linked to upthread - the one that focuses on how to deal with unwanted water retention? The best advice I offered was to concentrate on making sure your plants are in a soil you can water to beyond the point of saturation w/o having to worry the soil remain soggy so long it limits root health/function. That means you either start with an appropriate soil of find ways to limit water retention, which brings us back around to the link that takes you to the thread about dealing with water retentive soils. It's hard to tell you precisely what to do w/o you having a basic understanding of what plants require to remain healthy. Particularly important and a prerequisite to a healthy plant is a healthy root system. All of the information you need to be an accomplished container grower fits together like a jigsaw puzzle under assembly. Each piece is connected to the other pieces - either directly or extraneously, but they ARE all connected. You probably remember that it’s easier to assemble a puzzle when you work toward getting the outer 'frame' together first. The outer frame is analogous to an understanding of the basic bits knowledge required for your success. Of the basic knowledge, most important is an understanding of how the soil/water relationship works & how the individual soil components interact relative to the whole. Basically we need to understand that a healthy root system is a requirement if the plant is to be healthy. Then, and easier to understand are a very few additional issues like the importance of light to your growing experience, how fertilizers work and what fertilizer is most appropriate ……. We also need at least a very basic understanding of how some of the other cultural conditions might affect plant growth/performance. Once this basic but essential understanding is part of your skill set, that is to say the framework of the growing puzzle completed, assembling the rest of the pieces will occur at a rate exponentially faster than the rate at which you progressed at the outset of your growing experience. Unless this basic framework is complete, you’re essentially relying on trial & error, which is probably never going to gain favor as a short cut to success. Al

The contrast between "people time" and "plant time" can cause the grower some anxiety and frustration until the grower realizes there's a distinct difference and makes the adjustment by giving in to the idea that a plant has its own ideas about how long it should take to bounce back from adversity. Fortunately, the best form of resolution is usually no more complicated than procuring a few more plants so they can work as a team to satisfy your need to nurture. SOIL: I have perlite so I will add in more of that. Not sure if this is a bad idea, but I do have gravel I could mix in If you decide to include some gravel, use it in the bottom 6" of soil where it will displace the organic fraction of your medium that would normally be filled with water. This is a form of ballast. Don't use it as a layer, just mix it half and half with the bottom 6" of soil where the perched water table (excess water) resides. This in itself will reduce the amount of perched water your soil will hold by 1/2), and my neighbor has bark in her backyard that she said I could have some of to mix in if that's a good option for now? Depends ..... all bark is not created equal. Size and type of bark is very important. BALLAST/WICK: In reading through your posts I understand there are several ways to set these up, but I have an extra terra cotta and plastic pot so I figure this might be easiest? You mentioned covering the drainage hole in this post That reference was to the overturned pot you would be using as a form of ballast such that the rim of the pot would be down and the drain hole would face up. You don't want soil to drop through the drain hole in the ballast pot, so cover it. , but I also noticed [here[(https://www.houzz.com/discussions/dealing-with-water-retentive-soils-dsvw-vd~1415041) you said another option would be to leave the hole open and put soil underneath so that it acts as a wick. That is the pot-in-pot technique where the main pot is nested into another pot and rests on top of the soil in the lower pot. This soil acts as a wick. If the soil in the lower pot is deeper than the ht of the perched water table, ALL perched water should move from the upper pot into the lower pot. For this application, there should be nothing over the drain hole(s) in the upper pot - the one the plant is in. Would you suggest one over another in my situation? I would go for the pot as ballast + the gravel in the bottom 6" of soil as added ballast, and even a wick if you like (in the lower pot). I have two options for pots to put inside as ballasts, but I'm not sure which would be the best option. The terra cotta pot looks like it may not take up enough room to help with limiting PWT, but the plastic one may be too large? The plastic one is great - cover the drain hole in it. Ideally, there would be an inch or so of soil above the ballast pot. Fill in the sides with the 50/50 gravel soil mixture up to the top (former bottom) of the overturned pot - cover it with an inch of soil with no gravel - set the plant on the soil - fill in around the edges. As long as you're taking steps to eliminate perched water, it doesn't matter how large your pot is. You can put your plant in a 55 gallon drum if you like, w/o concern you'll be over-potting. ...... once I repot the plant into the better mixture and add the ballast, should I water the plant again or hold off given the amount of moisture already present in the soil? Plants do best when the soil is evenly damp/moist - never wet/soggy. Skip watering if your entire soil mass is moist. Keep in mind, with the steps you will have taken to eliminate perched water, over-watering shouldn't be a problem, as long as you're reasonable. You're making a soil serviceable that otherwise wouldn't be considered as such by a very large fraction of effectual growers, so it's best to try to minimize potential limitations. Use a 'tell'. If possible - site your plant away from heat sources, but in a warm spot with plenty of light. If possible, use a room humidifier and keep humidity in the 45-55% range. I keep my basement grow room at 55% by using a combination of home-made passive evaporative set-ups and 2 ultrasonic humidifiers. I have a R/O water system, so almost never have to clean the humidifiers. To eliminate potential for bacterial issues, I add an ounce of H202 (hydrogen peroxide) every time I refill the reservoirs. Al