I disagree with nearly all you said, except for a couple of facts: 1) that highly aerated fast draining soils are far easier to grow in and offer plants significantly better opportunity to realize as much of their genetic potential as possible, and 2) roots are the heart of the plant, and w/o a healthy root system, a healthy plant is only a dream. I disagree because the basic premise upon which your claims rest are faulty ..... and I'm sure we can agree you needn't be a bus driver to know what makes the wheels go 'round and 'round. I didn't say that anyone is having trouble growing in high porosity substrates, so please refrain from putting words in my mouth. What I said, basically, was what it says on a bag/bale of potting substrate has little to do with what's in the bag. Every packager of retail grow media seriously pushes the limits of veracity in order to capture the unsuspecting buyer, and this extends to fertilizers and hundreds and hundreds of other products which target hobby growers. In my considerable experience, I've come to recognize it's not possible to build a highly aerated medium based on large fractions of fine ingredients. Example - start with a pint of peat in a quart jar, then add a pint of perlite. One would think the o/a air porosity would increase significantly ...... but it doesn't. Perlite is not internally porous. IOW, it is a glass foam which has solidified and trapped air inside internal cells, and the internal cells are not gas or water permeable. A ping pong ball is full of air. Add a dozen to a pint of peat - see if the o/a air porosity increases or decreases. A PP ball cannot ADD porosity because the cell at its center is closed. Let's say the dozen PP balls filled the half jar of peat, so you now have a quart of soil, but the volume of air porosity in the new mix created by the combination of the 2 ingredients is limited to the volume of air space between the original volume of peat particles. When you double the volume of a medium w/o increasing air porosity, you reduce o/a air porosity by 50%. To be fair, perlite has an uneven surface, which would add some air porosity, but the small fraction of air porosity added due to perlites irregular surface can never be even close the the volume displaced by the particle because of its closed cell nature. There is something called a "threshold proportion" that needs to be considered. Lets start with a pint of peat again and start adding pine bark with a 1/8- 3/8" size gradient. When we reach a 50/50 mixture of peat/bark, there is still more than enough peat to fill every all space between bark particles with peat. Where is the advantage in adding the bark. Like the perlite, it simply decreased o/a air porosity, but to a lesser degree than perlite would because barks internal pores are open and gas/water permeable to some degree. Even at 75% bark and 25% peat, the roots will essentially be growing only in the peat, and the air porosity of the usable fraction of medium available for root colonization provides the air porosity of peat alone. In rteality it will be less because the weight of the bark diminishes the loft of the peat, but we needn't rely on that fact to complete the thought. At some point, by continually adding more bark, we'll arrive at the threshold proportion, where there is exactly the volume of peat needed to fill all air spaces between the bark particles. From that point forward, increasing the ratio between the bark and peat rapidly increases air porosity; so, if you really want to take advantage of media which are ACTUALLY highly aerated and fast draining, you'll always be working with media that have a very large fraction of ingredients larger than about .100". which is the particle size gradient at which it is not possible for a medium to hold water in the spaces between particles. Since this is only true when particles are uniform in size/shape, the actual size at which perched water disappears in practical applications will be closer to .125". Perched water is a thief that always flies below the radar until you learn how water behaves in grow media. Substrates based on large fractions of fine products like peat, coir, compost, composted forest products, sand, topsoil, are going to support lots of perched water. An experienced grower can look at the soil, feel the texture, and predict within 1/2" how tall will be the PWT (perched water table) the substrate will support at container capacity. Most bagged media supports in the range of 3-6", with 4-6" being the norm. I can't say how tall the PWT will be in the medium you discuss, but I can say with a good deal of certainty, if the medium is indeed comprised of large fractions of peat/coir, it will be too much for you to make the claims you made. How about we compare. You show me what your healthy root systems look like, and I'll show you what mine look like. Seem fair/reasonable? Al

Might get a better response in the houseplant section, though I see you have it outdoors. I didn’t comment solely because this is one plant I’ve never grown in gritty mix, and I have mine indoors year-round. Mine is also in a comparatively small pot, in a soilless medium—in fact, quite dense in appearance with very little perlite compared to any of my other pots, even. The small amount of soil drains really rapidly but remains a level of damp that I like very much, and then dries fast because it’s so dry here. I deliberately used a soil called VermiPro for these attributes. So I water it relatively often (once a week these days?), and flush the soil heavily every 2-3 watering when I lug it outside. Is your GM the exact replica of Al’s? Were all components wet before you mixed it up and planted? Did you sift/screen properly? If I had to guess, I’d say it’s adjusting and that you can expect some additional leaf loss while it settles in. The photos don’t look TOO worrisome for a new repot (which is not common, in my experience, but not rare either), so I would just keep an eye on it. Sorry I can’t be of more help!

How much root was on it. It is not getting enough water to the leaves. The pot looks very small but that may not matter if there is very little root. New cutting like that I often put in a large clear bag.............xl ziplocs work well for smaller cuttings. This keeps the humidity up while the plant grows new roots. With time I open the top of the bag more and more until I can eventually remove it. These plants like slightly moist soil but the soil mix should be open and drain excess water freely. Potting soil with extra perlite added along with some bark chips added (you can mix some commercial orchid mixture in) seems to work well for me.

Oh, that's a sweet little guy! He looks happy. I have a few Monsteras and they are experiencing slower growth this time of year. The few new leaves that exist are unfurling at a snails pace. Looking at your picture of the roots, I would say repot but no rush. Just go up a wee bit in size if you do repot. Hope that helps. Good luck to you and your lovely plant. :)