Stretched Echeveria

You have an Echeveria that is really suffering because of poor conditions. It is stretching and losing its color because it is not getting enough light – It looks like it is also way overwatered. It’s difficult to bring them back to normal at this stage so here’s what you can do – bare with me! First, stop watering. The very lowest leaves are goners so just pull off and toss. Take a look at the overall length of the stem from soil level up to the top. Cut the head of the plant off about half way up that stem. It should leave you with a stem in the pot with a few large leaves attached, and the decapitated rosette in your hand. Move the pot with the original stem to an area that receives very bright light, even a bit of direct morning sun. Don’t water that pot again until the soil has become fairly dry. When it has, you can water again. This is the way you typically want to water succulents, letting the soil dry out a bit before watering again. With any luck, in a few weeks you should see some tiny new rosettes forming on that old stem and you’re home free. It should grow as a multi-rosette plant, and if you keep it in the brightest, slightly sunny spot you have, it should color up, grow more compact and rose-like. Now for the heat you have left over, remove a few of the larger lower leaves and save them, giving your rosette just a little stub of a stem on the bottom. Stick it and the few saved leaves and put them on a paper plate and put them somewhere out of the way for about a week so they can callus over their cuts – I usually stick them on top of the refrigerator so I don’t forget them. after the week, prepare two small new pots with new potting mix that drains well. Gently just snuggle the little stub of the rosette into the soil of one pot, and lay the leaves on the soil of the other pot with their skinny ends just touching the soil – they sometimes do this easier if you lay them upside down. Now, for both pots, back on the fridge or wherever, out of the sun, and no water – just dry soil. Leave about another week or so and by then you should start to see new roots on the leaves and the same thing should be happening on the rosette stem. NOW give them a good drink and move them to the brightest location – avoid full sun for a while until they get going. Water them as I had mentioned before allowing the soil to dry out slightly before watering again. If the Plant Gods are with us, you will wind up with at least one healthy plant to start with again, but likely you’ll have several plants after awhile – GOOD LUCK!