Succulent care is pretty straightforward. They’re desert plants, so they like it warm, dry, and sunny. They hold onto plenty of water in their leaves so they barely need watered and you can usually go weeks at a time between watering them. The most common succulent issue we see from our plant parents is overwatering, which makes the leaves and roots begin to rot and soften. RIP, little succulent buddies.

For this blog, we took four succulents and tested them under different conditions to give you an idea of how they might do in your home. To minimize the variables we used the same variety of succulent for each example: Echeveria Miranda.

What We Tested

Our Echeveria Miranda succulents were kept in the following conditions (seen left to right in the images below):

1. Dry, low light

2. Wet, low light

3. Dry, on a windowsill (brighter light)

4. Near a heating vent, medium light

The succulents were placed in their testing locations on January 21 and brought back to our studio for their “after” photos on February 19, so these results indicate four weeks of in-home experience.

All plants were equally watered when they were taken home from our greenhouse, and the “wet” succulent had a cup of water added to its pot to simulate an overwatered environment. No additional water was given to any of the four plants for the four week trial.

The window was well insulated and a little cool, but not drafty.

Our Results

This isn’t exactly a proper scientific study, but we did notice a few things that can help you properly care for your Echeveria Miranda! We found in our results that light and temperature seemed to make a much bigger impact on this variety of succulent than moisture did.

You can see from the images that every succulent except the fourth (kept near the vent) stayed pretty consistent after a month in their various habitats in the home.

Due to the temperature fluctuations from a heating vent in Ohio in February, there was a lot that our fourth succulent had to endure! You can see its leaves drooping and some discoloration, so if you notice these effects in your own succulent, check nearby to see if it’s dealing with drafts (warm or cold). A more consistent environment lends itself to healthier succulents, even if they’re not getting a ton of light.

You can also see that the window sill succulent (the third in the photos) has the most upright leaves, indicating that it benefited from having more bright sunlight than the lower light plants.

What Next?

We’ll be starting another trial on one of our plants for another in-depth look at plant care under different home conditions. Let us know what plants you want to see!