Root health depends on several things, but the most important of those factors involves a triangle that can work for you or against you. Soils based on fine particles don't hold enough air at container capacity. Container capacity is the state of water retention in the soil after the soil has been completely saturated and has just stopped draining. Soggy soil kills fine roots. When air returns to the roots, the plant spends energy it shouldn't have to spend to regenerate new roots - so a cycle of death and regeneration develops that's extremely costly to the plant in terms of reserve energy. During the soggy period, roots can't effectively take up water and the nutrients they need, which are dissolved in water. Poor root function often leaves the plant unable to keep distal parts, like leaf tips and margins hydrated, so leaves often develop necrotic areas that spoil the plant's appearance. The 3 sides of that triangle I mentioned are your choice of soil, your watering habits, and your nutritional supplementation regimen. All 3 of these important considerations are firmly linked to the each other and affect the others. If you can get them right, your job suddenly becomes much easier and the rewards for your efforts greater. Your margin for error becomes significantly more forgiving as well. You should be growing in a soil that allows you to water at any time of the year, such that the entire soil mass is completely saturated and at least 15-20% of the total volume of water you used to irrigate passes out of the pot through the drain after complete saturation. Get to that point, and the rest is as easy as choosing and using an appropriate fertilizer regularly. Almost all of the problems (health, appearance, insects, disease) described in this forum are related to poor root health. A plants best protection against disease and insects is a robust metabolism, and the metabolism of a high % of plants are suppressed by poor root health. As below, So above - Healthy roots Are what we love If the link I'll leave below makes sense, I'll link you to another thread that goes into detail about container soils and water retention. Gaining an understanding of the information in that thread probably represents the largest individual step forward a container gardener can make. Without question, it transformed my growing experience. Al Here is a link that might be useful: This one first

The non-Jade looks like a Haworthia. The Jade plant is a small-leafed (aka compact) Jade. It could be Crosby's Compact. Josh

Ok, thanks for the input. No chance it's fertilizer burn or thrips/some kind of pest? I scratched some fertilizer into the soil on this one for some reason even though this soil probably doesn't need it.

When we remodeled the kitchen in the 100+ year old condo unit that we owned we needed to bring it up to code. The kitchen had only 2 electric outlets in it. When the electricians attempted to run wiring to one wall of the kitchen we were surprised to find out that that wall was concrete block covered with plaster. The electricians had to make channel cut in the blocks to run the wires through. Talk about dust! With all the holes that had to be made in all the walls, the contractor decided to cover the walls with 1/4 inch dry wall rather than trying to blend in all the patching. It turned out great but no one told the cabinet guy that behind that nice new drywall lurked a concrete block wall. I was there the day he was installing the cabinets by himself and he couldn't figure out why he his electric drill/screwdriver was having trouble. I suddenly remembered about the block wall. Time for a different drill bit! Also we had refinished all the hardwood floors in the place before we did the kitchen, if only we had known that beneath several layers of linoleum in the kitchen were the same great maple floors that were in the rest of the place. We felt bad about covering them up with some tile-look laminate but at that point it was too late to go through the floor refinishing process again.. I bet that you will find the pine flooring under your kitchen floor layers. I am sure that a good floor refinisher will get them to match the other floors even with any patching that might be needed. Good luck. Can't wait to see your new space.