Twenty-two and nursing a gardening addiction in a little apartment while I figure out life. I prefer succulents and other weirdos of the plant world, but all plants are beautiful. Questions and comments are welcome. Suggestions are welcome if you have thought them through.
My Ledebouria socialis is putting out flower stalks! I’m really excited! I hadn’t introduced this plant yet because I keep meaning to re-pot it before I did so (since I wanted it in a nicer pot as well as planted high enough to show off its nice maroon bulb-like succulent stems, which you can see only a bit of there).
The “socialis” part of the name of this lovely foliage plant comes from the fact that it clumps rather prolifically; now that I’m watering mine again (oops) it’s already starting to throw out offsets along with the flower stalks, even in this little plastic pot. It’s been quite a trooper putting up with my erratic watering, probably because it’s getting such good light in my third-story south-facing window.
(Photo taken 2/8/2013)
I went to another meeting of the local cactus and succulent society! It was pretty cool. These are some plants that were being sold by one of the members. I quite liked some of them, but they were out of my price range (having a greenhouse around here is expensive, and I gather the gentleman was trying to make up the price somewhat).
Crassula Buddha’s Temple
(via davidszalay)
Merry early Christmas to me! My lovely sister got me some succulents for Christmas and decided to go ahead and give them to me since she was worried about their bareroot status. I think they’ll be fine until I get back to my apartment in a few days.
The upper picture is Sempervivum calcareum (finally I have a sempervivum!) and the lower is Haworthia miribilis var. triebneriana (love those ropy haworthia roots!).
This perfectly ugly cactus, Ariocarpus fissuratus, won ‘Best in Show’ at the meeting of the local cactus and succulent society I went to.
Haworthia Cooperi Truncata at a meeting of the local cactus and succulent society
Haworthia herbacea at the meeting of the local cactus and succulent society. I am desirous of this one.
This wasn’t labeled, or really talked about by the speaker, but I’m assuming that those are sempervivums grown in tufa or hypertufa. (taken at a meeting of the local cactus and succulent society).
So, the above is my sole attempt at the art of the succulent terrarium. I have long thought that the idea of planting succulents in a terrarium or other drainage-less container was rather poorly conceived, but when I received these tiny sedums, I could not resist the idea.
The main problem with succulents in terrariums is that succulents like it dry and are prone to suffer when over-watered, and terrariums are pretty much designed to hold in moisture. However, at least in this case I found that the succulent still seemed happy as long as I watered carefully and infrequently.
The downside is that the roots grew down visibly into the drainage rocks and green goop (algae?) grew on the inside of of the glass. Not quite picture-perfect, but most casual observers only notice the cuteness.
How I did it:
- Bought champagne glass from thrift store and disinfected it.
- Used rocks for drainage, putting in the largest rocks (3/4 inch) first, then medium rocks, then small rocks. Layering the rocks in this way preserves the drainage space by keeping the small rocks and dirt from slipping all the way down.
- Finished up the drainage layer by adding a layer of perlite.
- Filled the remaining space with cactus and succulent potting mix and planted the sedum.
Haworthia ‘korizato’ for sale at a meeting of the local cactus and succulent society
