Jades do not like overheated cooked roots would be more accurate, Drew. Yes, that is probably the problem i had. For sure. Thanks for pointing it out. Yeah in California they are in full sun. My first jade was about to be killed as a weed from San Diego. My aunt lives there. I took it off her hands. Anyway again because of the pot heating up I have had best results in partial shade, your miliage may vary. Mine tends to grow weak in the winter as I'm unable to give it enough light. I prune it down in the spring. It's about 38 years old. I'm really bored with jades and I would just toss it, but my wife is attached to it. So how many jades have you grown? Any pictures? Here is one I grew from a broken branch off the orginal. About 4 years old. Grew well in partial shade too! You can see though how close the sun is. This post was edited by Drew51 on Tue, Aug 19, 14 at 23:09

Thanks for all the pictures. Are you satisfied as-is or do you have plans for pruning/directing growth? I'm not saying it needs change, it is beautifully shaped as-is. Just wondering what your plans are. It would be brash indeed to insist this go into a gritty mix since it has done so well in its current soil. Caution is definitely worth repeating however. If a person waters appropriately the plant can thrive in a water-retentive soil. The problem comes in when someone waters frequently, waters some more as the answer to all plant problems, and waters still some more to fulfill some nurturing tendency(that'd be me). The soil then tends to stay soggy, and the plant spends a lot of energy repairing and replacing waterlogged roots instead of growing. If this continues the plant is at risk to be overwhelmed with root rot and death. At that point there are not enough roots to use the water, and the soil is destined to stay soggy until the haggard plant is rescued, or it simply gives up the ghost. With an appropriate gritty mix, the waterlogged condition never occurs, thus it is safer for the novice/casual grower, though under watering can slow plant growth too. (With a quicker wet-dry cycle in a gritty mix, faster root growth can occur and subsequently faster plant growth. Another advantage.) I was trying to talk water, but in the process got very long-WINDED. Stopping now. ez

The flowers are very small, no more than 3/16" in diameter. They range from white to pink and have a faint smell similar to daisies. When I get home from work I'll post some pictures if no else has. Unfortunately, they are notoriously stingy bloomers. They need lots of sun and age to really have a chance at flowers. Pulling it off in NY would be quite a a feat. Likewise, potted plants are even less likely to flower. Someone once told me that a plant needs a trunk of at least 2" or 3" in diameter to have any hope of flowering, but I have no idea how true that really is. However, the only Jade of mine that blooms is a really big cutting (3" diameter trunk) that including the age of the mother plant, is easily 50 years old. All the same, you might wait to hear from some other Crassula fans around here before you get too discouraged. In particular, Norma is far more experienced with these than I, and PirateGirl has some real experience growing them in your neck of the woods...

Struw, Actually, I bought five of these bulbs in the December, 2008 to use for lighting for my seedlings. At one time last year, I had just over 1,000 tomato, pepper, basil and flower seedlings in nursery trays. I never really thought about using them to grow mature plants as they do not have enough illuminance, at least I do not think they do. This experiment is an accident. I had ordered a 400 watt HPS system and had planned on growing the plant under it. But I had already transplanted it and needed to move it from where it was (under a 150 HPS) so I could install the new system there. I could not hang the other HPS anyplace but had this CFL in a socket so decided to try it. Stuck it in a socket with a reflector and place it just over the plant. It took about a week longer than anticipated to get the light and set it up to work. Over that time I started noticing how the plant was getting so bushy but not tall. So I decided to let it go for a while. It's a 77 Days to Maturity plant and has been transplanted for 40 days. So I should have close to a month before I start seeing blooms of any significant number. I'm still presuming I will need to add more lighting to this plant once it gets taller, that is, if it develops blooms more than 6-8 inches lower than the canopy. It won't be an equal test because of the difference in temps (cooler temps do help restrict vertical growing) but I may try another grow this summer using the 400 watt system with a couple of these bulbs. Mike