Ulog 60: Transplanting A Citronella Plant & Preparing To Make Citronella Oil

As you can see this citronella plant that I brought indoors last autumn has grown leaps and bounds. It was taking up a good corner of my 48x48 tent and it needed to be transplanted into yet another larger container.

I took it from the 3-gallon bucket and decided it was ready for the 5-gallon bucket; gosh knows I have more than enough of those around the homestead.

While I had the plant out and was sitting on the floor with it, I removed any browned leaves from it, trimmed off some healthy larger leaves for another post and project I'm working on (see below) and I cleaned it up real nice.

Filling the 5-gallon bucket up with Mother Earth Coco-Coir with perlite soil. This is the same soil I used for all of my cannabis plants and clones.

When I received the citronella plant last summer, I used the same soil to start it off in because it wasn't in the healthiest condition. I figured the perlite would possibly help the plant to survive. Here is the original post from eight months ago when I had first received the plant. It was stemmy and the leaves were dropping; I really had no hope for its survival at the time.

I have this bucket filled about 3/4 of the way to the top. When I transplant anything into these 5-gallon buckets I like to leave at 3/4 full for a few days to let the plant settle into its new home and have the dirt settle down some too. I packed the soil down with my hand and fist so the roots will have a sturdy home. I learned this technique from growing cannabis and since the coco-coir soil can be on the light and airy side as far as soil goes, packing down the soil seems to work the best for a solid base.

I'll be adding more coco-coir dirt in a few days after the dirt in there now has completely had a chance to position itself.

I added two tomato/garden stakes (which may be difficult to see in the image as the sunlight was shining in through the kitchen window as well as the sky light above my head), then took some twine to tie off the plant. It (the plant) has become so top heavy and I wanted to make sure it has enough support and doesn't break or topple over.

These are some of the healthy leaves I trimmed off ans set aside so I can make some citronella oil later today. I'll share that recipe perhaps tomorrow here as well as some ideas on how to use the citronella oil.

Even though it has been a few hours since I finished this transplant, the kitchen's aroma of citronella is still prevalent.

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