If you own a Peperomia graveolens (AKA Ruby Glow plant) and want to care for it properly, you need to know its nutritional and environmental needs.
To properly care for Peperomia Gravolens, water it once a week to keep the soil moist, put it under filtered sunlight, and ensure that humidity is between 50-70% and that the surrounding temperatures are between 15-24°C (59-75°F). You can propagate this plant by using its stems, leaves, or seeds.
If you own a Peperomia graveolens and are wondering how to grow and propagate it in your home correctly, keep reading! I’ll tell you everything you need to know to take care of it properly.
How To Grow Peperomia Graveolens
In order to grow Peperomia graveolens successfully, there are several things you need to be mindful of.
Watering Needs
Peperomia graveolens is not very demanding regarding its watering needs; so long as you don’t overwater this plant or neglect it for too long, your Peperomia graveolens should grow out just fine.
However, if you want to optimize your plant’s growth, you’ll need to water it according to its ideal requirements. What are these requirements? Well, this highly depends on two factors:
- What stage of growth your plant is in (i.e., if it is still growing or if it has reached maturity)
- What season it is (i.e., summers or winters)
If your plant is still in its growing stages, it’ll require more consistent watering, so watering it every three to four days should do the trick. The correct way to water your plant is first to check the upper layer of soil for moisture. If the first inch (2.5 cm) of the soil has dried, you should water your plant until the top layer becomes moist again.
When your plant matures, its watering requirements become a bit more flexible. You still need to water your plant as soon as the upper layer of soil goes dry, but for mature plants, you can water them once for the entire week (although if you decide to do this, make sure your plant’s pot has proper drainage).
During winters, your plant’s growth will be stunted, so ensure you water your plant less during that time; otherwise, you will risk overwatering your plant, resulting in wilted leaves and rotten roots.
If you’re housing your Peperomia graveolens and other plants indoors, I recommend you get HC’s 2-Gallon Plant Watering Can (available on Amazon.com). It has an external measuring scale molded onto the can’s body to help you measure the amount of water you pour in and out of it.
Soil Needs
Regarding soil needs, the Peperomia graveolens can be a bit particular about things. If you don’t keep your plant in suitable soil, you risk stunting its growth and leaving it prone to diseases.
So, what soil should you keep your Ruby Glow plant in? Well, the first thing you need to know is that the soil needs good drainage. If your plant’s soil doesn’t drain well, it will start waterlogging when you water the plant.
As I mentioned, this can result in your plant’s leaves getting wilted and its roots developing rot.
Additionally, your plant will thrive if the soil has good aeration and water absorption properties. To strike the ideal balance between all these properties, I recommend maintaining a two-part peat, one-part perlite ratio in your soil. This will automatically give your plant’s soil all the above-mentioned properties.
Temperature, Lighting Conditions, and Humidity
The Peperomia graveolens is native to Ecuador, which means that it is adapted to environments of high humidity and subtropical climates.
To put it more concretely, it is recommended that you maintain humidity levels within the 50-70% range around your plant. Anything excessively above or below this range could either seriously stunt your plant’s growth or leave it prone to pests and diseases.
If it’s dry where you live, consider investing in a humidifier for your plant- they can artificially improve the humidity levels around your plant.
As far as this plant’s ideal temperature requirements go, anywhere between 15-24°C (or 59-75°F) should optimize your plant’s growth. If you live somewhere with colder climates, consider investing in a mini heater or sun lamp for your plants.
Finally, as far as lighting requirements go, Peperomia graveolens grows best under bright light. Note, though, that this is different from saying that you should place this plant under direct sun.
If recklessly placed under the direct sun, your Peperomia Graveolens could easily burn up and die, especially if you do this during the summers. So, the best way to meet your plant’s lighting requirements without risking your plant under the sun’s heat would be to keep it somewhere it receives filtered sunlight.
A few good ideas that come to mind include placing this plant under the shade of taller plants or trees in your garden or placing it outdoors under a shade of cloth with holes poked in it.
If you live somewhere where there’s a lot of cloud cover, or if you plan on keeping this plant indoors, consider investing in a sun lamp for your plant.
How Often Should I Fertilize Peperomia Graveolens?
If you follow all of the caring tips we’ve discussed so far, you won’t have to fertilize your Peperomia graveolens often in order for it to survive.
However, If you want your plant to really thrive and grow to its full potential, then appropriate fertilization will be crucial- especially during the growth season (spring and summer).
Ideally, you should fertilize your plant twice (maximum thrice) during the growing season. The kind of fertilizer that works best with this plant has a 20-20-20 NPK (nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium) composition. During winters, you will only need to fertilize your plant once- since its growth will be temporarily halted during that time.
By the way, if you’re not sure which fertilizer brand you should go for, try Jack’s Classic 20-20-20 Fertilizer (available on Amazon.com). It’ll be perfect for your Peperomia, and it’s reasonably priced too!
How To Pot and Re-Pot Peperomia Graveolens
An essential part of caring for a growing Peperomia graveolens is knowing how to pot and re-pot it appropriately according to its size. I say this is essential to the care of a growing plant because these plants will need larger pots or planters once they’ve outgrown smaller pots.
If you don’t know what size pot to use for your plant or if you don’t know how to properly move it to another pot, you risk stunting the plant’s growth or causing its death.
If you plant your Peperomia directly into your garden’s soil, you won’t need to worry about potting and repotting. Just be mindful of the soil composition and fertilization needs we spoke of earlier.
However, if you do decide to keep it in a pot, make sure the pot is appropriately sized for your plant. One way to check this would be to see whether the plant’s roots make it all the way down to the bottom of the plant or whether they start pushing against the side borders of the pot.
If either or both of these are true, select a larger pot for your plant. As a general rule, you should re-pot your plant to a larger pot yearly. This is important not just because your plant will need more space as it grows but also because, over time, the soil in your plant’s pot will lose its nutritional strength and will need to be replaced.
How To Prune Peperomia Graveolens
Gardeners know how important appropriate pruning is to the health of any plant. When it comes to the Peperomia graveolens, pruning isn’t frequently required; however, to stimulate healthy leaf growth in your plant, you should prune older, weaker leaves every two months or so- just don’t go overboard with it.
How To Propagate Peperomia Graveolens
Ensuring that your plant’s growth needs are met is one half of the caring process; the other half is knowing how to propagate plants once they’ve matured.
Luckily, in the case of Peperomia graveolens, you have several ways of doing so:
- You can propagate the plant using stem cuttings.
- You can propagate it through leaf cuttings.
- You can propagate it using seeds from a mature plant.
Whether you decide to propagate your Peperomia through stems, leaves, or seeds, just remember you don’t necessarily have to plant them in the soil to propagate them; Peperomia graveolens can just as well be propagated in water.
You Can Use Stem or Leaf Cuttings To Propagate Your Peperomia Graveolens
Propagation through stem cuttings is the fastest way to propagate a Peperomia; the leaf-cutting method isn’t a bad option either, but it’s slower because the plant has to grow more.
Here are the steps for both these methods:
- If you decide to propagate using stem cuttings, break off a healthy stem at least four inches (10.16 cm) in size from a mature plant and ensure that its leaves are still intact.
- Dip the stem cutting (from the point where it was broken off) into a rooting hormone.
- Now ground this cutting into a potting mix of two parts peat and one part perlite, and make sure the soil is moist.
- If you decide to propagate this plant by leaf cuttings, follow the same steps as mentioned above with leaf cuttings.
You Can Use Seeds To Propagate Your Peperomia Graveolens
Propagation through seeds is a slow and delicate process with low chances of success compared to other methods; nevertheless, it is still one way you can propagate your graveolens plant.
To propagate your Peperomia graveolens using seeds, follow these steps:
- Take fresh seeds from a mature graveolens plant (or buy them from a nursery)
- Dry these seeds out for one or two days and then put about five to six inches (13-15 cm) deep in a small pot with a soil mix of two parts peat and one part perlite.
- Water sparingly over the next couple of weeks (do not water it too much)
- You should see small leaves emerging from the soil a couple of weeks into the spring season.
If you want to learn more about how to propagate these plants, or if you’d like to get a visual sense of all of the aforementioned steps, check out this really helpful YouTube video I found; it’ll tell you everything you need to know about propagating this plant.
FAQs
Do Peperomia Graveolens Catch Pests and Diseases?
Not as such, but if you see cotton-like masses on its stem, it might be infested with spider mites. Use pesticides if this happens.
Is Peperomia Graveolens Toxic?
No, Peperomia graveolens is not toxic.
Summary
Here is a summary table on how to care for a Peperomia graveolens:
| Watering | Water the plant such that the upper layer of soil is always moist. |
| Lighting | Keep under filtered sunlight. |
| Soil | Composition: two parts peat and one part perlite. |
| Temperature | The surrounding temperature should be within 15- 24°C (59-75°F) |
| Humidity | Anywhere between 50-70% range. |
| Fertilizers | Fertilize twice during the spring season and once during winter with a 20-20-20 NPK fertilizer. |
| Repotting | Re-pot your plant to a larger pot yearly- especially if roots poke out of the drainage hole. |
| Pruning | Every 2-3 months. |
The plant can be propagated through its stem cuttings, leaf cuttings, and seeds.
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