Today was my supervisor’s official last day in the lab (though she’ll still be helping with our work before she moves to her new school). As a parting gift, I brought her a cute cutting from my heartleaf philodendron that I rooted in water last week and potted up this morning (pictured).

The little heartleaf philodendron cutting I gave to my supervisor as a parting gift.

She’s had a huge, trailing variegated pothos on the windowsill by her desk since before I started working here, and she sadly says it’s too big to travel with her.

The mother pothos plant is huge and happy in a sunny lab window.

Assuring her it would be taken care of, “Phyllis” moved to reside in the window by our PhD candidate’s desk. She allowed me to take a few cuttings, so I nicked them off with a sterile razor blade and stuck them in an Erlenmeyer flask on the windowsill by my new desk. What a lovely friend to have brighten up the lab!

Day 1: I washed the (3) pothos cuttings and put them in water to root.

While I was looking it over during its photoshoot, I spotted several groups of tiny eggs on the undersides of the leaves, so I took the cuttings over to the sink, rubbed down their leaves under running water, dried them, and replaced them in clean water in the flask. I let them sit in the sun for a bit, but I moved them to a shadier spot on my desk before I left for the day.

Variegation detail on one of the cuttings.

A wrinkly new leaf on one of the cuttings (it hasn’t unfolded all the way yet!)

I hope these babies take their time to root, because I will need to find a good pot (and some soil!) to bring in for them.

I am very excited about my new beautiful pothos cuttings.

I’m a happy new pothos owner!

-Amy