Hello everyone, I have a question for those who are seasoned cutting starters.  I have more than a few cuttings that are really taking off right now, some doing better than expected, some in the middle, and some that are behind or look like they won't make it.  Which is to be expected, I realize that.

My question is what might cause a seemingly healthy cutting to wilt and loose it's leaves overnight?  I suspect a lack of humidity might be the cause but I wouldn't think it would happen so quickly like that.  Still perfectly healthy cuttings right next to it in the same conditions.

I've had others do this (drop leaves), but I left them alone and now new leaves are starting up.  Is this a normal pattern until I get a good enough root ball going to sustain said leaves?  Maybe I took it out of the humidity chamber too soon?

Any ideas, comments or general discussion would be much appreciated.

Other notes:
"Grow Room" temp is always right around 70-72 deg.
Humidity varies 40-60% depends on how much the heater runs.
Cutting in question is a CddN in a vermiculite/Perlite mix.
No, I did not allow the mix to dry out and the roots are not sitting in water.

I've planted multiple cuttings from the same plant in the same bin and under the same conditions while many thrived, some still failed.
I'm not sure that there is a 100% method that guarantees success.
One thing for sure is that I have more success with fresh cuttings than cuttings that were stored in the fridge for a month or two.

From my observations leaf drop seems to happen for 2 reasons
1: over watering,roots not sitting in water but still for some reason roots too wet get a rot,leaves wilt and drop off-never had a cutting come back from this.
2: sometimes when leaves firm first they might drop a leaf or two because there aren't enough roots to sustain all the new growth.Normally for me the leaves seem to 'die' a bit at the tips first,they don't always drop these leaves,depends on the relative size of the roots to the leaf area, or they come out of the bud and just stay small and soft,they never seem to get bigger,they just stall and then drop off.Had this on a Fall Gold cutting when I checked yesterday,no roots yet,rest of the leaves seem fine

My guess is that it has something to do with the nutrition side of it.  Maybe time to get it into some real soil and see if the roots thrive.

You raise a good point there,I just re-read your original post and see you used a perlite/vermiculite mix,little if any nutrition in such a mix,I use perlite/coco coir,as soon as I see roots I start with a little dilute water based fertiliser,otherwise with a mix like yours you are relying only on the energy in the cutting and water.I would be careful with vermiculite as well,I tend to find it holds too much moisture,hence I switched to coco coir