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Spider plants are prolific growers. They can take up to two years to mature and start to produce their little plantlets. And after that, it’s plantlet city. They grow a ton of them. One plant can produce hundreds of pups in its lifetime. Additionally, they are known as an invasive species in multiple countries because of how quickly they grow and how many plantlets they can create. For a houseplant parent, especially if you’re a beginner houseplant parent, this is the gold mine of plant propagation. You can propagate your plantlets very easily. There are a lot of different ways to propagate plantlets and we’re going to talk about all of them today.
Water
The first and most easy way to propagate a spider plant is to use water. Water is readily available to a lot of people, especially if you’re taking care of houseplants. It’s not something that’s going to be extra or expensive or something you have to go out of your way to get.
You just need a jar and some water, preferably a smaller mouth jar. The longer the plantlet is still attached to the stem, the faster it is going to grow and the harder they’re going to be. You can remove them from the stem and place them directly in the water or above the water slightly, allowing that humidity to evaporate, and then the roots will grow from there.
You can also leave it attached to the plant parent. Stick the jar next to the mother plant and then just place the stem of the plant directly in there. It’s going to grow prolifically. Then you will have a fully rooted plant that you can migrate to whatever media you want. You can place it in leca,pon, or even soil. You can plant it back in with the mother plant to make a more bushy plant. There is the option to put them in nursery pots or gift them to friends. This is a very versatile propagation method.
Propagation Box
Another method is to create a propagation box. We have a whole video on how to create a propagation box for you. Essentially, you want to have a clear box with a top lid that you can seal up. And then you’re going to put whatever media you want in there. The best media that we have found to work for baby spider plants in a propagation box is sphagnum moss because it creates a very humid environment.
You can go ahead and just trim the plantlet right off the mother plant, and stick it in a prop box. It will root quickly for you, especially if you use a product like super thrive. It just speeds up the rooting process a little bit, but it is not necessary.
Soil
This last method is a little bit controversial and it just depends on your environment. If you have a very dry environment, this method isn’t necessarily going to work the best for you. However, if you have a higher humidity environment or you have a greenhouse environment, then this is going to work out well for you. You can just propagate your spider plantlets right in the soil.
You can just take the base of the spider plant and attach it to the soil. Also, you can pin it there if you would like. You can remove it from the mother plant or you can pin-wrap it around and have it grow at the base of your mother plant and it will grow roots from there. This is slower than the other two methods, but it also prevents you from having to transplant it to soil later. So it depends on what’s going to work best for you. It is still a very easy method to propagate, and it’s one less plant for you to worry about having in different locations as well. You can separate them from the mother plant.
Some people have used the seedling trays and they’ll just put soil in there and then place all the different plantlets from their one giant spider plant right in there. A few weeks later and then they have a lot of plants to share.
So it does take a little bit longer to root. But it just depends on your reasoning and why you are trying to propagate your plant. Which method is going to work best for you? You do need to make sure when you’re propagating the plantlets in soil that you’re keeping it moist. This ensures they have constant humidity.
You do need to pay attention to the root growth to prevent rot. When you start to see new growth on your plant and then it doesn’t pull up easily with a gentle tug, then you know it’s rooted in there and good to go. You can cut back on the watering after it is rooted. You don’t have to water it as much because the roots will hold onto water. Until that happens, you do need to make sure that the soil is staying moist and that there is a lot of humidity in the general vicinity. So that way it promotes a lot more root growth.
Spider plants are prolific growers. They’re very easy beginner plants. They are a great starter plant for plant parents trying to learn how to propagate, or if you’re trying to find plants to trade for newer, more expensive plants. This also works well. If you have a friend that you are trying to get into plants, then spider plants are a great one as well. Hopefully, this encouraged you to try a few different ways. And see which way is going to work best for you and your home. You can go forth and gift many spider plants to lots of other people and bring them into the house plant community.
