Stevia

Hi,

I'm growing stevia indoors.  I have a liver problem so stevia is the only sweetener I can eat.  I have 2 plants in 12 inch pots that I plan to grow indoors with a grow light.  I have a few questions.

- What's fertilizer brand should I use?  I've heard certain fertilizers make the plant taste bad.

-How long should I run the grow light every day?  It also gets some light from the window, but its east facing which is not ideal.

-When you harvest the leaves do you leave the stem or cut that too?  I read on one site to harvest at 8 inches tall.  My plant is 9, but not growing wide and pretty small.  Should I cut everything above 8 inch?  I don't want to kill it.

-My grow light can be white, white/blue, white/red, or White/red/blue.  I assume I need White/blue?  Red promoted flowering which we don't want in a  stevia plant right?

Thanks,
Cody

ps.  pic of plant attached

Hello - no personal experience growing stevia, but I have a diabetic friend who swears by it.  From what I find from the local herb supplier, tip prune to encourage bushiness.  Cut stems and dry, or dry individual leaves, but leave a goodly portion of the plant to grow. It can grow up to 1 metre.  Leaves may also be used fresh.  Well drained acid soil . . . like sun, but also shelter.   It also said it was perennial, but deciduous.  Over to you - let us know how you go.

Jill Dyer wrote:tip prune to encourage bushiness.  Cut stems and dry, or dry individual leaves, but leave a goodly portion of the plant to grow. It can grow up to 1 metre.  Leaves may also be used fresh.  Well drained acid soil . . . like sun, but also shelter.   It also said it was perennial, but deciduous.  

I grow it and this is all accurate. It is native to Paraguay, so it likes sun and heat, but it will bolt when things get too hot. I've never had one last more than a year so I don't know what it takes to make it perennial.
I use rabbit poo and comfrey tea on mine, not sure about other fertilizers, you want more nitrogen (for leaf formation) compared to the other components. Since you're growing inside you may have limits about smells, etc. I don't grow inside so I really don't know about lights, unfortunately.

I've been growing it for some years now, both in pots and in the ground when i've lived in a warm climate.  Yes, just keep tip-pruning to encourage it to bush out and give a lot more tips to harvest.  The stems are much less sweet than the leaves so usually I just tip-prune to harvest, much as one would pick basil.  You might try leaving a few long stems and try to layer them into the soil, I find that propagating new plants is extremely difficult....tried cuttings every which way and they always fail....sometimes a plant will sucker out at the base and I can carefully split it, or else I let some seeds form, but these have a low germination rate.  I find my plants start to flower under short daylength in the fall, and I try to keep the blooming tips pruned out and this encourages the plant to actually survive....it might die back and look pretty dead after blooming but it usually comes back.  I just put mine outside for the summer and they spend the winter in the sunniest window in the house.

On the subject of failing cuttings . . . try the split the bottom of the cut stem and insert a grain of rice method . . . if you haven't already.  It has worked for me on difficult subjects, although the sage was a complete bust - but I did forget to water it through a very hot period, so my fault, not the plant