Causes of Jade Plant Wrinkled Leaves

Sometimes the leaves of my Jade Plants can begin to look wrinkled. There are a variety of reasons your Philodendron may have wrinkled leaves, but it can still be alarming to some plant owners. I'll go over the most likely culprits for Jade Plant wrinkled leaves in this post and provide suggestions for preventing them in the future. Depending on the cause, some leaves that are wrinkled can become plump once again. I'll also cover the steps to prevent new leaves from becoming wrinkled.

Reasons for Jade Plant Wrinkled Leaves

Moisture Issues

Jade Plants may display wrinkled leaves if they do not get enough water. Because they are succulents, and they hold a lot of moisture in their leaves and stems, Jade Plants don't need to be watered as often as other non-succulent houseplants. This can lead to Jade Plant owners not watering their plant enough because they are being cautious about overwatering.

However, to complicate things an overabundance of water can also cause Jade Plants to have wrinkled-looking leaves. With overwatering you may also see some droopy stems and the soil is often over moist. It's hard to explain well, but overwatered leaves might appear wrinkly or wilted, but still feel like they're full of moisture while the underwatered leaves from above will feel thin and not full of moisture.

The first step to addressing moisture issues is to correctly identify which issue you have. I personally recommend a cheap soil moisture meter for any plant owner. This will give you more information on the level of moisture in your soil and all around the pot. If you have been underwatering, it's a good idea to bottom water your Jade to let it soak up the moisture it needs to replenish the plant. The good news is, many of the leaves may re-plump if you have been underwatering. If you have been overwatering, you need to back off of watering until the soil dries out, not completely but nearly. The leaves that were damaged by overwatering will probably never look quite the same as they did before they became wrinkly.

Old or Damaged Leaves

Old and damaged leaves will often appear wrinkly. That is just the leaf losing moisture as it begins to die off. The moisture from that leaf is absorbed by the rest of the plant to be used. Old leaves are going to be the leaves closest to the trunk, not the ones sprouting from the ends of branches and stems. They are often larger than the other leaves as well as you can see below.

Unfortunately, there is not much you can do to prevent old leaves from existing on your plant unless you prematurely break off the old and damaged leaves. You can do this, but then your plant won't get the chance to reabsorb that moisture from the dying leaf.

It's very natural for the oldest leaves to eventually die off of a plant, there's really nothing you can do to prevent it. You can take some measures to prevent leaf damage, but realistically most of you are probably already doing this. If your plant is somewhere it might often get bumped or knocked over, then of course you could move it.

Cold Temperatures

Jade Plants kept indoors are unlikely to encounter temperatures low enough to cause leaf damage. However, if your Jade is outdoors it may. Some succulents are very cold hardy but Jades like to stay above 60 degrees Fahrenheit. A Jade Plant that has become too cold may show some shriveling or wrinkling on the outermost leaves. Leaves damaged by cold will eventually fall off there is nothing you can do to repair them

As I said, it's unlikely that an indoor Jade Plant gets too cold unless you keep your house quite cold. It may happen if your Jade Plant is in a window and some of the leaves are touching the window glass. In the cold of winter that can be frigid enough to cause damage. If you find that to be the case, you should move your Jade Plant away from the window in the winter to prevent any cold damage.

Pests

Several pests like to feed on Jade Plants. I've personally battled mealy bugs on my biggest Jade. Luckily, I caught it very early so it wasn't too big of a fight but it can be. The other pest you see on Jades is scale insects. I've heard spider mites too, but I've personally never seen it even when nearby plants have broken out with spider mites. All of these pests cause damage to the Jade leaves which eventually leads to the leaf shriveling and falling off.

It's hard to know how to prevent pests. Most of the time we're not sure how we got them to begin with. The best thing you can do is visually inspect your plants for pests often. This will help you catch the issue early, which makes eradication easier. The most common Jade pests are mealy bugs and scale insects, which are both armored pests. So unfortunately you can't just spray the plant with insecticide and wait for it to work. These guys have to be scraped off. Some people dab them with an isopropyl alcohol swab to remove them. Either way, it's tedious.

These are the most common causes for a Jade Plant to have wrinkled leaves. Hopefully, you found some information here to help diagnose your Jade's problems.

What has your experience with Jade Plant leaf wrinkle been? Share in the comments.