Why is my Echeveria losing leaves?
I’ve had this Echeveria for almost a year, and got most of that time I’ve had it in my room on my windowsill. I moved it outside onto my porch a week ago so it could get more sun, and it looked like it was getting etiolated. I checked on it today, and I saw that many of its leaves were turning squishy and purplish—not the usual crinkly brown texture that tends to accompany etiolation. I took it out of its pot and the roots looked fine, but the leaves seemed soft and floppy. There was also a lot of white powder on some of the leaves that I’m worried might be fungus. So what’s going on? And what should I do? Should I try to help the plant recover, or just “chop and prop”?
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Best Answer
I’m not an expert on acclimation but If you have a plant that has been indoors for most of the time and you want to place it outside, usually you want to place it under another taller plant so it gets dappled sunlight or let it stay outside for 30 minutes for one day and an hour the next day and an hour 30 minutes the day after and so on until you get to having the plant outside all day past the afternoon. However, in my experience with an Echeveria Galaxy Blue, an extremely light hungry succulent that did not like my college dorm room at all, I ended up visiting back home and placed it under a leafy hosta looking plant on the porch that faces the sunset and it’s been doing fine for well over a year.
The sun here in NC is intense especially during the summer afternoons. The roots don’t look wet but the leaves are damaged. I can only suspect possible sun scorch if you moved it outside immediately instead of acclimating it. Edit: Yeah, those leaves look burnt ngl. That white powder is natural farina that is supposed to protect the leaves from intense sun but they were likely exposed to too much all at once. Either move it to a shadier spot on your porch or place it on your brightest window sill and remove the damaged leaves to let it heal.