Aeonium Arboreum: How to Take the Cuttings

I got my Aeonium arboreum (the variety is “atropurpureum”) at a lecture about succulents at the San Francisco Botanical Garden about 20 years ago.  The curator of the desert garden at the UC Davis arboretum was speaking and brought plants to sell.

This was one of the very first succulents I ever bought, and I carried it with me when I moved to Santa Barbara. I now have three of them in pots and a few in the garden, so I want to share with you how I take cuttings of this small tree-like succulent.

This plant, like other aeoniums, tends towards a somewhat tall and leggy growth habit.  The individual stems will eventually branch at different points, giving them even more interest.  If they branch towards the top of the stems, the weight of the heads can cause them to bend over. That’s exactly what happened to mine; it was planted right outside my dining room window 8 years ago.

Here’s 1 of the stems that I cut off with the branches shooting off of it.  The whole thing was completely down on the ground this past winter.  

I wasn’t planning on doing a video on this particular aeonium, but because it fell over, I decided why not.  If you have this succulent, just be prepared because it may happen to your plant, too. See how I take cuttings of it in this video:

This is one plant for which you don’t need to take cuttings from the soft wood or the tender new growth. I could have let that tall stem heal over for a few weeks and planted it just like that.

However, the Aeonium arboreum grows relatively fast. I wouldn’t want to plant that tall stem because the same thing could happen all over again within a short period of time.

Here you can see I cut the aeonium into “bite size” pieces.  Because the heads are fairly large, I wanted to cut the stems down which eliminates their chance of toppling over.

By the way, this is what the stems look like when they’ve healed over.  These cuttings were taken over 3 months ago.

A few things to consider when taking of Aeonium arboreums:

• Make sure your pruners are clean & sharp as you want to make nice, clean cuts.
• Take your cuttings at an angle. It reduces the chance of infection & makes for a sharper point when sticking them into the mix.
• The stems & branching stems can curve, so you can either work with that or make the cut above the curve.
• Even though the stem has been cut down, the head may still be heavy in proportion. You need to stake the cutting.

My original intention with these Aeonium arboreum cuttings was to replant them with the mother plant. However, I decided there were already enough stems in that particular planting, so I gave most of them to my friend who lives in Oakland when she was visiting.

And the couple of cuttings that remain … well, in just a few weeks, they’ll be making the journey with me to my new home. Cuttings on the move!

Happy gardening,

Nell

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Nell Foster

Nell, the founder of Joy Us garden, was born into a gardening family and grew up in Connecticut’s countryside. After living in Boston, New York, San Francisco, & Santa Barbara, she now calls the Arizona desert home. She studied horticulture & garden design, working in the field all her life. Nell is a gardener, designer, blogger, Youtube creator, & author. She’s been gardening for a very long time & wants to share what she’s learned with you.

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