Peperomia Care Tips — Ep 096

hey guys happy Valentine's Day and it is nearly the two-year anniversary of Homestead Brooklyn so I wanted to share a special episode if you've been following along on my journey then you know that my favorite genus in the whole world is peperomia and many of you have requested a care video on peperomia what I hope to do in this video is give you really good care tips for peperomia because they're not all created equally and also maybe find a peperomia that is right for you because their care tips do Barry [Music] so if you look at this whole table I actually have them arranged in a certain fashion if you go from the front of the table to the back I've tried to include some of the smaller varieties or the ones in smaller pots all the way up to the taller peperomia in the back if you have a very keen eye you'll also notice that they're not all peperomia on this table I have some growing in terrariums so you'll notice like this begonia or this Colin Cowie or maybe even this dorste enniaa that are is kind of poking out so don't get totally confused most of these are actually pepperoni on the table and if you go from my left to my right you'll notice that there's far more succulent varieties over here and it gets less and less succulent as we go over towards the right and that will come into play as I share a little bit more of the care tips with you so peperomia actually grow pan tropically which means that they grow above the equator and below the equator in the tropics own you can actually even find peperomia in the United States growing naturally or natively like this peperomia obtuse if olia variegata which is a cultivated variety but this can be found growing in places like Florida although peperomia are primarily found in Central and South America and also throughout Asia there's about 1,700 species of peperomia and I would not be shocked if there is actually more than that and if we actually find and discover new species only because they are such diminutive species you'll also notice that some of the larger ones like this peperomia polly bhatt ria are even not that large and that's what makes these such great varieties to grow in the home partially because they grow in small spaces and oftentimes we're tight and short on space in our homes and our apartments but as you're hiking in the native environments where peperomia czar from you could often easily overlook them because they're often growing in like little craggy rocks or epiphytic lis which means on top other things like wood or fallen logs so it's so easy to overlook peperomia not only indoors for as indoor houseplants but also in the wild so that's why I think that will probably be discovering more and more species as we go one way that we could actually include peperomia into its own genus is because of the inflorescence or the reproductive parts of the plant now out of all of these that I have here there's only two that are actually flowering this peperomia along gotta so you'll see this long spike 8 flower coming out and also this peperomia blonde a-- which you can see here it has a much more diminutive small spike coming out of here now these are often called rat tail like flowers or catkins and some plants in particular like this peperomia Fraser eye which is called flowering peperomia which is in this little terrarium has a slightly different flower as does peperomia paradox which I actually don't have a version of it still has that spiky in fluorescence but it has little flowers kind of growing off of it more parallel to the ground so it looks a little bit prettier now it was really interesting because I was in the bedroom where this peperomia elongated grows and the Sun was coming in and I walked by and I saw all this pollen dust coming off of the flower in the light and it just goes to show me that probably peperomia are pollinating through wind pollination or maybe there are certain flies that come here but also in some cases self-fertilize so if they have another flower stalk that's growing on the same plant or a different plant they could actually fertilize themselves but typically how people actually take and propagate peperomia is not through its pollen or seed but it's through actually taking a leaf cutting so you'll cut the petiole which is the little stem that connects to the leaf blade and you could stick that into some soil and then from that little leaf and that leaf blade you'll have a new peperomia that comes out of that it will be the clonal variety of that particular species but again it's very easy to to actually propagate peperomia which I think also makes it a great house plant for people so let's go over the different and succulent nature of peperomia and how you'd actually care for it indoors so over here as I mentioned there are much more succulent leaves and you could see like this peperomia grave lens or this peperomia Dula performace or this peperomia tetra Phila these have really hard succulent leaves hard succulent stems and typically when we think of succulent plants like echeveria crassula or even some cacti we think of them growing in these kind of desert like conditions and when we think of deserts sometimes our head goes to like Oh lots of sand or sandy environment but that's not the case for a lot of peperomia particularly the more succulent varieties these are oftentimes growing in Zurich or dry conditions but often under the forest canopy or in craggy rocks and that's part of what actually makes these really interesting house plants because they're dealing with these really extreme conditions so maybe it's super dry and then it hits it like a little bit of a rain storm and in some cases there's been studies in like peperomia della performace for instance where they've actually not watered the plant for 70 days and then they finally water it and it pumps right back up so these are really resilient houseplants if you don't want to be on top of your plants constantly I'd get a little bit more the succulent varieties now if you step over here you'll start to see peperomia in Cana and peperomia virtus alotta which have these fuzzy leaves which is quite nice but again these are plants that are accustomed to drier conditions and probably have a face a little bit more harsher son conditions because it has this white fuzz that probably protects it from the Sun but also protects it from losing its water and if we start going over here a little bit more you might recognize some of these plants this is a peperomia cap errata and i have a few different versions pearl and raspberry ice and also the silver frost one and it has these ridges or furrows on its leaf and I can imagine this is something that collects water and then drips it off so it might face some situations where it's very dry one minute and then it might be very wet the next so this plant has to deal with some of those types of conditions and that in that situation peperomia as well as other plants develop these strategies in order to be able to keep water in the inside and developing hairs on the leaf is one of those and also developing this kind of cuticle so if you look at some of this shiny nature of this peperomia argyria for instance or this peperomia polly bought ria or even this peperomia metallica you'll notice this kind of Sheen and that is a thin layer of cuticle that actually helps keep the water in in the case of Dulla performance I was mentioning this epidermis and about 80% of the leaf is that epidermis it's that water storage unit and that thin layer of cuticle on the top is actually what keeps all of that water in you take that cuticle off and then that plant will actually dry out quite readily so that cuticle is very important these plants do require a little bit of humidity and moisture and they don't need to be in super bright Sun even though when you think of succulents you think oh I should stick it right in my windowsill and my southern or with Western window spill sill especially if you're in the northern hemisphere but you don't these could actually be pulled away as a matter of fact this cannot G I put peperomia Komachi I I'm actually growing a little bit further away from my Northeast facing window and it's growing extremely well so that just goes to show you another good reason as to why to grow peperomia in the home that you don't need such bright light conditions in many cases I'm actually growing these further away from my windowsill or even under grow lights in the case of this peperomia doll Shetty I peperomia quadrangular as' and peperomia Tetra gonna these are all growing and as my as well as peperomia veerudu these are all growing under grow lights without any problems whatsoever then as we move over here in the peperomia metallica peperomia Veera dis even this pepperoni are Jia which is this like watermelon pepperoni it has these like really beautiful watermelon colorations and then over here you have very thin leaves so peperomia blonde peperomia Jameson Ayanna peperomia cubensis this peperomia clover cultivar right here peperomia rubella and then the least succulent variety that I have is peperomia Fraser I and these I would say require a little bit more of like terrarium light conditions so they like a little bit more humidity it's probably better growing them in glass and they have a certain succulent nature but they're a little bit more frail so if you would like a peperomia that you need to take care for a little bit less you don't need to have to water as often then I would say stick a little bit more to the succulent varieties however in my experience no peperomia really likes to have its roots too wet so i tend to go with a much more well draining mix of soil so you'll see this soil that I mixed here it's some cacti soil with some extra perlite which is puffed volcanic stone and I have some bark in there and actually a little bit more clay and this will actually drain much better than if you're just using something that's like really PD for instance if you have a real peat heavy mix then oftentimes the water will just kind of stay in the soil and if you ever have to repot your peperomia you probably want to do it with a little bit more of a well draining mix I haven't had to repot my peperomia very often however because one of the benefits of having this diminutive epiphytic plant it is it doesn't mind being a little bit root bound and I after growing peperomia for years I've never actually seen any of the roots coming out of the holes of my planter pots so I think that they're actually quite happy growing in such limited conditions in this case now there are some peperomia that I've had to struggle with sometime the argyria plant or the watermelon peperomia which has these really beautiful stripes and colorations i've lost on one occasion and i just then keep it in its own plastic pot because sometimes I just get really excited and I want to plant the plant into a pot right away a better looking pot but sometimes it's better just keeping it in its own nursery pot and putting a cash pot or cash PO it's called around it and then you could just deal with it that way and you don't have to actually deal with transplanting it [Music] again let's just recap on what makes peperomia awesome and one is it's a small plant so if you're short on space in your home then this is a plant for you the other thing is that there is a range of peperomia from going really succulent to less succulent and the ones that are a little bit more succulent are slightly easier I think in my opinion to take care of because you don't have to water them all that often and also peperomia don't need to be in such high light you give a little bit more of a higher light condition for some of the succulent ones but they don't really need it and in fact they might actually even dry out if you give it too high of light conditions so having a more diffuse light or a medium light or even under grow lights and these plants will grow entirely fine and as you'll see in my next episode there's just such a range in a variety of peperomia that there is definitely one out there that you'll fall in love with did this video help build your confidence caring for peps if so give a shout out in the comments below and be sure to stay tuned for my next video showcasing some of my collection support more videos like this by subscribing to the channel and be sure to click on the notification spell so you know in the next video drops and stay tuned to more news on my blog from Steph Kirkland comm follow my daily journey on Instagram homestead Brooklyn and dive more deeply into house plant cultivation and care at house plant masterclass calm you

Channel: Summer Rayne Oakes

Views: 233,066

Rating: 4.9344263 out of 5

Keywords: Summer Rayne Oakes, Homestead Brooklyn, Plant One On Me, plants, houseplants, indoor plants, garden, gardening, house plants, houseplant care, Peperomia, Peperomia care, Peperomia care tips, Peperomia propagation, Peperomia plant, Peperomia plant care indoors, Peperomia obtusifolia, Peperomia prostrata, Peperomia caperata, Peperomia polybotrya, radiator plant care, how to care for Peperomia, indoor gardening, indoor garden, apartment garden

Id: AyilDNrtO84

Length: 14min 43sec (883 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 14 2019