New Plants!

October 16, 2018October 15, 2018 Wil.O2 Comments

I’ve shown you the ACSS Show n Sale and East Austin Succulents but I haven’t shown you what I brought home! I know the suspense must be killing you. Selecting the plants almost killed me.

It was REALLY difficult to narrow down my decisions. There was a lot of stuff I was more than willing to take home with me. Some gorgeous Cereus validus ‘spiralis’ and some Tephrocactus geometricus as well as some sort of crested variegated euphorbia that made my heart skip a beat.

Here’s what I settled on though from the Show n Sale.

I know… more variegation!

You’ve probably all seen an Aloe ferox before. They get huge and turn into trees. Mine is still more of a baby and no idea what I’ll do when it gets to ‘not fitting through a door’ size.

Not sure how I’ve never seen this plant before. It’s an Aloe striata. Mine’s still young enough it hasn’t started spiraling out yet so probably a pup from a much larger plant. They get big leaves and they stress to have pink margins with that wonderful striation pattern on the leaves.

Next up we have another variegated haworthia. It’s not terribly uncommon but ya know how some plants just make you love them more… this one does.

This was the purchase I waffled on the most, a Haworthia coarctata variegata. I think she cost me $8 which is a pretty good price and if it wasn’t for the variegation I would have skipped here anyway.

The plan is when spring rolls around to repot this lil baby. Whichever one the variegated is attached to I’ll leave it attached to and the rest will come off. I’d like to see about creating a mound of yellows powered by one green.

East Austin Succulents was amazing as usual. I was trying really hard not to overspend so I kept myself super tame.

I’m really starting to build up a collection of the different agave americanas and I had never seen this one before. It’s the regular plant but the variegation is more randomized than the other cultivars that have the stripe along the center. Random to me means lots of possibilities for some beautiful pups.

*Daisy letting me know she was going to astroFIGHTUM me if I didn’t take her inside to the AC.*

I also picked up my first astrophytum. If you’ll remember the pics from the show n’ sale there was a much older one. I didn’t even knew they grew vertical. I thought they just kind of got larger like a barrel cactus.

Looks like I didn’t take any good pics of the small variegated plant there. It’s an Aloe nobilis variegata. I’ve got a regular Aloe nobilis that’s about a foot tall now and she throws off pups left and right. I’m excited to see the future of this lil’ one.

See ya later succas!

Gardening · Succulent

Aloe Oh Nose!

August 6, 2018 Wil.O1 Comment

Well this past week has been a whirlwind. Work is gearing up for the start of school. One of my plants is in full on rebellion which has me in a tizzy but I’m using retail therapy to feel better!

We’ll start with my rebellious plant.

aloe oh nose 4.jpg — *aloe brevafolia variagata*

Now, from the top she looks pretty good. Everything seems to be fine…

aloe oh nose 3 — *aloe brevafolia variagata*

You see it yet? The newer leaves look totally fine but notice the shadows on the larger leaves?

aloe oh nose.jpg

They’re starting to collapse! I assumed it was a lack of water. It has been hot as the devils junk in a brass cod piece. Then we got 2 days of rain and it didn’t puff back up at all. I should probably have given it a few more days to see if it absorbed more water… but I was panicky.

aloe oh nose 6.jpg

The pot it was in was plastic and in Oklahoma we have high humidity. That means they don’t dry out as fast and plastic doesn’t breath so it takes even longer. I just feel better with terra cotta.

aloe oh nose 5.jpg

The stem is nice and hard. None of the roots felt squishy. No bugs that I can see and the way this aloe forms there’s no way to get to the stem from where all the leaves come out of past this point. Short of maiming it anyway… and I’m not there yet.

aloe oh nose 7.jpg

I repotted on Thursday and we’re supposed to get rain this Wednesday. If we don’t then I’ll take the water hose in my own hands. There’s been no massive temperature (ie. passenger seat of the car with a vent blowing on it) which can cause rupturing in the cells. There’s no heavy discoloration.

I JUST DONT KNOW!

Fingers crossed for lack of water.

To destress though I decided to take a jaunt over to Joyce’s nursery. Nothing makes me feel better than new plants!

First up we have mammillaria bocasana fred cristata. From what Joyce told me in the past this was all the rage for this plant. Everyone just wanted this version of fred as a cristate. Then at some point people started planting the nodules that form on it and everyone wanted that.

mammillaria bocasana monstrose 061018b — *mammillaria bocasana fred monstrose*

For reference that’s the nodules that come off. You plant one and get a mound like that. I think the crested version is going to be even more undulating madness. He’s ready for a new pot and I have an idea of where he’s going to go so we’ll see!

Next up we have a haworthia coarctata variegata. It’s been rooted since may and shows signs of growth so it should be fine. There’s some very light striations in it. It’s going to be super slow growing but I’m up for the challenge.

haworthia coarcata variagata 3 — *haworthia coarcata variagata*

You know me and variagated!

I’ll keep you updated on the aloe and see ya later succas!

Pic Post · Succulent

Updating the Ole’ List

July 30, 2018July 29, 2018 Wil.O2 Comments

You probably haven’t noticed but at the top is a ‘Spreadsheet of Plants’ link. It links to a different page on the blog and on THAT page it links to a spreadsheet. Which sounds scary.

It’s not.

plant catalog example

I’ve been slowly updating it as I get plants or find old pictures and as I take new ones. This post is really just an FYI there’s all my plants plus it’s going to contain a lot of pictures so I can add them to the archives. If you like posts that are mainly pictures…

Here ya go.

Agave lophantha ‘quadricolor’ – Mines shape is all off but otherwise seems healthy. *shrug*

Copiapoa humilis ssp tenuissima – I’ve had this since last years show n’ sale and it’s done decent on growth I think. Originally I thought that ‘long stem’ was one of the round ones stretching for light. It hasn’t plumped up though since being out in full sun just continuing to elongate. Oh well. I can always break it off if it gets unsightly.

Crassula arborescens ‘ripple jade’ – Mines still tiny… that’s a 2 inch pot. I got it as part of my monthly succulents program back in the spring.

crassula arborescens ripple jade 072918.jpg

Deuterocohnia brevifolia – Not a major update on this since I’ve only had it coming up on 2 months. I was looking closely at it though and noticed the rosettes have a bunch of lil’ rosettes in them. I guess it divides (like a cell) as opposed to growing an entire new one on a stem.

Echeveria ‘unknown’

echeveria 072918.jpg

Euphorbia lactea – Obtained in 2016. It’s grown well but I sadly burned the shit out of it. It looks fine on one side and then you turn it around to see failure and sadness. I could always cut it up and make some new plants.

Ferocactus stainesii pilosus – Not 100% on the name. I’ve seen quite a bit of this lil’ cacti but never paid attention to it in the stores.

Haworthia coarctata v. tenuis – I’ve had this plant for sometime as well. I took some pics of it when I had it in full sun and true to haworthian nature it didn’t like that. I’ve found in our location that haworthias should be in bright shade. None of mine get full sun. Right after I took this pic I took some cuttings off it. I did that last year and it’s helped to cause it to be bushier. I forgot to take a pic of the other one I have. I’ve just let it grow and it has 2 stalks that are about a foot long.

Haworthia unknown – I probably need to bring this one inside because it hasn’t grown a single bit, too hot outside maybe causing it to go dormant?

haworthia unknown 072918.jpg

Kalanchoe humilis – Just a pretty plant that I’ve had since spring.

kalanchoe humilis 072918.jpg

Mammillaria elongata ‘copper king’ – Pretty sure I got this in Austin last year. Will have to go digging to see if I have some original pics. I like how there are all the new branches popping up towards the center. “I will not be contained!”

mammillaria elongata copper king 072918b

Mangave ‘lavender lady’ – My only mangave. They put on almost no growth during this past winter and the one I put in that glazed pot with the tiny opening. It’s gonna look great at some point and then… no idea how I’ll get it back out. The terra cotta pot was actually a vase from Target that went on sale. Drilled a hole and viola.

Myrtillocactus geometrizans – This was leftover at the 2018 Show n Sale. It was going to be thrown away but it was a giant pot of relatively fresh soil. I grabbed it just for that reason. I’ve been lettin’ it do whatever though and decided to try my hand at propagating these via cutting. We’ll see how it goes.

Pachypodium lamerei – Another one obtained at the 2017 Show n’ Sale. Doesn’t feel like it’s grown at all though /cry.

pachypodium lamerei 072918.jpg

Unknown plant – It’s a common plant, seen ’em at big box. I thought it had root rot but turns out it was sunburn…. I think. Maybe should go back and take another look at this plant. Some of it’s segments looked sunburned, turned black, and shriveled up but it never progressed (this was like 2 months ago). We’ll see what happens.

unknown 072918.jpg

Thanks for takin’ this trip with me! I got all the pics edited and taken care of but now I have to do the spreadsheet itself. Think I’m going to change the naming convention on the spreadsheet. Right now it’s just year and then 1 / 2 / etc. and can change it to the day. Will take a bit more space but it’ll take me some years before it gets unruly.

See ya later succas!

Gardening · Succulent

Pic Post!

July 12, 2018July 11, 2018 Wil.O2 Comments

Today is brought to you by my smart’ish phone and it’s ability to take pictures. If a picture is worth a thousand words then I don’t have to write anything… write?

Hahaha, I slay me.

euphorbia aeruginosa

hoodia gordonni

euphorbia mammillaria variagata

pachypodium lamerei

These first 4 are older pics. These were my buys from the COCSS Show N Sale in 2017. The two on the left sadly didn’t make it through the winter bedroom. I made some mistakes watering this past winter that cost me several plants.

euphorbia mammillaria variegata 071118.jpg — *euphorbia mammillaria variagata 7.11.18*

The euphorbia mammillaria has gotten a lot larger though. It’s leaning over and put out a lot of babies and I’ve been too lazy to repot it and straight it up.

aloe erik the red 071118.jpg — *aloe ‘erik the red’*

I’ve had this aloe for two years and it stresses out beautifully. It had a long stem though and I wanted to see if I could force some pupping so I beheaded it. That was weeks ago and this still hasn’t set off any roots and I still don’t have any pups. I decided to fill up the container with some soil and push the base into it. Here’s hoping for the best!

mammillaria bocasana monstrose 071118.jpg — *mammillaria bocasana ‘fred’ monstrose*

Fred got himself a new pot. He was sitting in a spot that got rain for 3 days in a row and he swelled up so big that he burst his little plastic square. What a fatty.

echeveria unknown 071118.jpg — *aloe ‘black gem’ variegata*

I actually got a clump of these in Florida. At the time this was a smaller pup with variegation in it so I grabbed it. I thought it was an echeveria but thanks to said smart’ish phone documentation I have the tag!

One of my newer aloes is starting to stand up which means it is definitely not what I thought it was… back to the google searching. Will update if I figure it out.

aloe jucunda 071118.jpg — *aloe unknown*

Next up we have a plant from East Austin Succulents, 2017.

3.19.17

7.11.18

You might think that the right one is the when I got it pic but it’s not. I had a lot of my euphorbias in the beating Oklahoma sun and didn’t water them enough. It led to it having a bunch of the branches drying up and dying off. It’s still recovering but I’m trying to do better.

Edit: I just realized I had this labeled incorrectly as euphorbia supressa… it’s not. At least not according to the tag when I got it. Maybe supressa is a hybrid? I have no idea.

peperomia graveolens 071118.jpg — *peperomia graveolens*

It’s an adorable peperomia! I haven’t even scratched the surface of this genus so I can only imagine the plants that have to be added to the wishlist.

stenocactus – agave albiopilosa – echeveria topsy turvy crest

echeveria uknown

aloe malculta variegata pup

Some more random pics. My aloe maculata variegata pup is getting some great striations in it and my stenocactus is all plumped up from the rain.

backyard pics.jpg

Buncha succulents on something I made that in some circles could be called a table and in other circles it might be referred to as an accident waiting to happen. Is it my fault that all 4 legs are shimmed just to give it some semblance of balance?

I mean… yea I guess it is…

Let’s talk about my dyckias!

all my dyckias 071118.jpg — *top left clockwise: marnier-lapostollei, red devil, fosteriana, something*

I have 4 different dyckias. I’ma keep them all close to each other and pray they flower at the same time so I can create my own dyckia hybrids!

That’s basically my whole collection. There’s some plants on the death trap and scattered around but for the most part that’s everythings.

See ya later succas!

PS: I’ll leave you with this picture which won’t have it’s story told for a few months. Can you feel the anticipation building?!

Gardening · Succulent

Between the work

July 2, 2018July 1, 2018 Wil.O2 Comments

Plants are work. Gardens are work. Everyone with one knows that. They’re beautiful and rewarding… but they. are. work.

Sometimes though, you get to just stand back and look. You get to take a stroll or sip some coffee and admire. A glass of wine near sunset or an early morning jaunt between the pots.

That’s one of my favorite times. When I can forget about the list longer than my arm of things I need to do in the garden and just appreciate them. Take a look at the streaks in the variegation or marvel at a new found flower.

mammillaria spinossima flowering.jpg — *mammillaria spinossima flowers*

Even better, find those new babies showing their lil’ bald heads. I was doing some general cleaning slash being lazy and looking at plants the other night and noticed this baby.

See the newbie poking up through the rocks?

Not all are a new surprise though. Most of the pups are relatively obvious and they’ve been there for awhile.

agave americana medio picta alba pups.jpg — *Agave Americana Medio Picta Alba Pups*

A majority of the plants I buy because I like them but I’ll take a plant that’s a little less pretty if it has children. The a. americana medio picta alba I bought for the main reason it had babies on it. There’s a 4th and 5th on the otherside of it.

061018

063018

This aloe maculata is gorgeous to me and it has an amazing pup attached.

The aloe brevifolia variegata I got back in the spring has decided to grace me with possibly 2 babies. The first pic is obviously a baby and the second pic is questionable. I thought maybe it was just the base of a leaf but when I turn it around I can clearly see where that leaf is at. I’ll be keeping a close look at it.

These are the pups from my dyckia marnier lapostollei. When I bought this there were 2 other specimens of equal price and prettier but this one had 2 sprouts on it. That makes it an easy decision for me!

echeveria pups.jpg — *echeveria perle von nuremberg and echeveria something something*

Echeveries are some of the easiest to get babies from . I beheaded both of these echeys in order to get babies off of them. The one on the right is spitting pups out all along the stem but the left one is my perle von nuremberg. I’ve been panically watching this and just noticed some new growth this morning.

Crisis averted!

bowl of pups and babies.jpg

This was a dish garden I put together literally 3 years ago. I pulled out a bunch of kalanchoe that had taken it over and other things were getting leggy… it was just time to start breaking it down. I beheaded the aloe (about a month ago and still it hasn’t popped out any pups). The black princes and topsy turvy both have all sorts of kids on the branches which is nice.

The a. americana variegated in the top left threw a kid all the way across the pot! Silly plants.

My agave quadricolor that needs to be repotted badly has some babies that are just itching to get out. They are trying to climb out of my fancy proven winners plastic pot.

agave victoriae reginae white rhino pups.jpg — *agave victoriae reginae ‘white rhino’*

This white rhino is my newest plant. She’s still a bit young and ugly duckling but she’ll grow into something amazing. It’s hard to miss with the giant red rectangle but there’s a baby in there too!

And last but not least is my favorite plant.

haworthia limifolia variegated babies 3 — *haworthia limofolia variegated*

BABIES!! They are a bit lighter in color but I think it’s just cuz they’re new. I’m hoping for some variegation in them though. How wonderful would a clump of these be?

There’s also a tiny one underneath that’s coming out. I think it actually has kind of a yellow stripe on it. Can someone make my plants grow faster please?!

See ya later succas!

Gardening · Succulent

Recent Plant Haul

June 4, 2018June 4, 2018 Wil.O2 Comments

A little while ago I wrote about going to J&J Cactus & Succulents. I showed a bit of her stuff but never mentioned what I got. I’m also gonna show you a couple of other things I’ve obtained this year.

haworthia limifolia 060418.jpg — haworthia limifolia

We’re going to start with this haworthia limifolia. If you’ve ever googled succulents you’ve seen the variegated versions of this and they are amazing. I got this one at the nursery in Florida… Florida Cactus.

This was the same place I got the unknown variegated cactus and the topsy turvy cristata (did you know crested and cristata mean the same thing?). I made Daddy T scour a giant haworthia greenhouse looking for a variegated one… but no luck.

BUT! BUT!! BUT!!!

…there I was at J&J Succulents and the first thing I noticed when I went in was…

haworthia limifolia variegated 060418.jpg — haworthia limifolia variegata

ISNT SHE BEAUTIFUL?! She’s just started putting out a flower spike so there’s nothing super pretty at the end of it yet. I’m going to try and make sure that they get uhm… what’s the word… it’s not fertilized? impregnated? You know what I mean. I know the variegation is a genetic abnormality but will that carry on into the seeds? If anyone knows I’d love to hear about it.

aloe brevifolia variegata 060418.jpg — aloe brevifolia variegata

I showed a picture of Joyce’s momma plant that is even more amazing. The variegation on the momma is much more stark though so I can only imagine how slow growing it is for her. I’ve got a bit more chlorophyll in mine so I should end up with a slightly faster growing plant with the possibilities of amazing babies.

aloe brevifolia variegata 060418A.jpg — aloe brevifolia variegata

When I first got her the difference in color between the dark green and the variegated areas wasn’t as dark. I’ve put her outside and she’s getting morning sun and really started to see the color differences better.

deuterocohnia brevifolia 060418.jpg — deuterocohnia brevifolia

This lil’ cutey that I got is probably the size of half of a dollar bill. At this size it’s really not that remarkable. In fact if I hadn’t seen this online then I would probably have skipped it.

deuterocohnia brevifolia BIG.jpg — deuterocohnia brevifolia

Look at that mound! That’s not me by the way… I stole this pic from the internet. Just google the plant and you’ll see what I mean. They make giant mounds! So thank you stupid internet for adding plants to my wishlist and HUGE thank you to Joyce for supplying my addiction.

The last plant I got from Joyce was an adenium desert rose.

adenium desert rose 060418.jpg — adenium desert rose

She had 2 flowers on her when I got her and I’m going to have to check on the care of this thing. They fell off so I’m not sure if it was sun stress or what. I didn’t think about the fact that it only had 1 branch I’m going to just let her grow and see what happens. I might end up with an adenium tree as opposed to an adenium bush shrug. Someone suggested that I could top cut her but it would be risky so not going to try it.

I know the pretty thick trunks they get is from exposing some of the roots everytime you repot but I’m not sure how often you repot it. Once a year maybe? Oh well… if I kill it I know who has some more for sale!

The final plant I’m going to show you today is an unknown dyckia.

unknown purple dyckia 060418.jpg — unknown purple dyckia

In the dyckia world there are so many hybrids that unless it’s marked when you buy it you’ll probably never know what it is. There’s a place in Norman OK, The Greenhouse. It’s the place I got the variegated sempervivums. I actually noticed that they had this dyckia around 2 years ago. It was in a big display piece that was WAY out of my price range and it was before I was bold enough to ask them to tear things apart so I could buy individual plants.

I was walking around with the hubby and noticed they had a succulent display they were pulling apart… and there my dyckia was. She was a clump of 6 plants and I had ’em leave one of the larger babies attached with two much smaller babies (that may or may not live, they’ve been repotted into the shade so we’ll see). The lady marked it $6.99 for me and I was almost doing backflips. I grabbed Daddy T’s hand and we flew to the checkout before anyone realized I was basically stealing it (at least in my mind).

unknown purple dyckia 060418A.jpg — unknown purple dyckia

Much to my dismay at the checkout was their new succulent guy. I think he’s the reason their succulent tent has become so amazing. Everything looks way better taken care of and you don’t see succulents that have a mound of weeds growing in them. He also breaks the babies off when they get too big as another plant to sell. That makes my job of finding an overgrown succulent with 20 babies for an insane price more difficult. I’m willing to let it slide though since its making them a better nursery and everything looks so great.

The poor thing does need some love and a new pot plus cutting off some of the ugly leaves but it’s going to rebound even more spectacular I’m sure.

Have a sunny succulent day all!