Succulent Plant Cultivation

How To Use Neem Oil Without Getting Your Plants Oily

2012-04-29T04:42:00.001-07:00

How To Use Neem Oil Without Getting Your Plants Oily

Neem oil is a highly effective and 100% natural pesticide, extracted from the seeds of the Neem tree in India. Neem oil is non-toxic to animals or people. Neem is systemic.

Neem oil is most effective when used as a preventive, meaning that you spray every crop regardless of whether or not you see a pest.

Many growers seem to be put off by its oiliness, finding sprayers clogged and plants left coated in oil. The solution is to get the oil broken down and suspended in the water, then we can get it onto the plants.

Fan Aloe, Aloe plicatilis

2012-04-03T05:26:00.001-07:00

Talking Plants: My number one fan aloe: The species name plicatalis means pleated like a fan. Local Afrikaans names include (according to The Aloe Names Book, Strelizia no. 28) Bergaalwyn, Franschhoekaalwee, French Hoek Aloe, Kokerboom, Tongaalwyn and Waaieraalwyn - in case you were asking.

What are F1 and F2 Hybrids?

2012-03-23T18:19:00.000-07:00

F1 and F2 are designations for hybrid plants. The Fs stand for Filial (Child or Offspring) and the numbers refer to which generation.

With succulent plants F1 refers to the offspring cultivar of 2 different parent cultivars, typically created through controlled pollination. With succulents, the F1 cultivars can be reproduced vegitatively via offsets, leaf cuttings, root cuttings or coring in order to produce faithful F1 clones without the difficulty of inbreeding for homozygosity in order to create strains that preserve the desired features via seed propagation.

F2 Hybrids are cross-pollinated or self-pollinated F1 hybrids and tend to have variable expression of the F1 hybrid parents traits due to the lack of homozygosity.

Nice Succulent Garden.

2012-03-10T10:41:00.001-08:00

Freeze Damage to Cacti in New Mexico

2012-03-10T10:17:00.000-08:00

Featured: Prickly Pear Cactus, Argentinean Saguaro, Hybrid Aloe, Texas False Agave, Queen Victoria Agave, South African Ruschia, Partridge Breast Aloe, Silver Torch Cactus, Golden Barrel Cactus, Argentinean Hedgehog Cactus, Agave. Jeff takes a walk through what was once a vibrant cactus garden and discusses the best way to save these plants.

Featured: Golden Barrel Cactus, Haystack Cactus, South American Barrel Cactus. Jeff cuts open a South American Barrel Cactus to expose the rot inside and determine if the plant can be saved.

Muiria hortense

2012-03-09T00:57:00.000-08:00

A video of a Lithops/Mesemb collection featuring a pot of Muiria hortense at about the 1:00 point. The narrator explains that a few grains of salt with each watering is what is needed to grow these previously difficult to cultivate Mesembs.

Vic Knight: Growing Conophytums and Lithops interview by Derek Castle

2012-03-08T05:02:00.000-08:00

Gasteria ellaphieae

2012-03-06T08:58:00.001-08:00

This is one of the more recent discoveries, found in 1989 in the Kouga Dam area. It is named after the first name of the illustrator of Gasterias of South Africa

Gasteria armstrong X Haworthia attenuata

2012-03-06T08:56:00.001-08:00

Gasteria baylissiana 'Sheilans'

2012-03-06T08:54:00.001-08:00

Gasteria bicolor var. liliputana

2012-03-06T08:53:00.001-08:00

Gasteria glomerata

2012-03-06T08:52:00.002-08:00

Gasteria nitida var. armstrongii

2012-03-06T08:50:00.002-08:00

Varigated Gasteria

2012-03-06T08:48:00.001-08:00

Gasteria batesiana

2012-03-06T08:46:00.002-08:00

Gasteria Batesiana is named after a London trolley-bus conductor, John Bates, who was an enthusiastic succulent collector. It is the Northern most representative of Gasteria

Gasteria vlokii

2012-03-06T07:36:00.001-08:00

Named after its discoverer, Jan Volk, who found it on boxing day 1984. Currently, my young plant is distichous but will later become rosulate and is already starting to cluster with offsets coming from the base. The leaves will become red tinged with exposure to direct sun.

How to Identify your Gasteria's Species

2012-03-06T06:29:00.001-08:00

This key is an ordinary English language translation of the Gasteria species identification key based on leaf shape and texture found in Gasterias of South Africa: A New Revision of a Major Succulent Group. The book contains a more detailed key including location information and an additional key that uses the full array of botanical identification tools including flowers. I highly recommend the book as it is an excellent and accessible resource on the Gasteria family. However, I found the species key a bit difficult for a non-botanist to work through due to all the specialist plant terminology so I dumbed it down for people like me.

Plants Without Stem (acaulescent)

. Leaves form a ring around the stem like a rose (rosulate), tapering, with a sharp edge on the bottom (keeled)

Leaf skin is bumpy like warts/noduled (tuberculate) or is rough (asperlous)

Leaf skin is rough (asperlous) ........................G. vlokii
Leaf skin is warty/noduled

Leaf skin is finely wrinkled(rugulous) and bumpy/noduled (tuberculate)...................G.batesiana
. Leaf skin is not both wrinkled (rululous) and bumpy/noduled (tuberculate)

Leaf skin is sparsely bumpy (tuberculate) ...G.carinata v. carinata
Leaf skin is densely domed-bumpy (tuberculate) ..G. ellaphieae

Leaf skin is smooth

leaves are long and narrow (linear triangular).......G.pulchra
leaves are long and narrow(linear triangular) to triangular lance shaped(triangular-lanceolate)

Leaf edge is finely serrated (Margin serrulate)

Leaf edge is not sharply serrated

Leaves erect and spreading ..... G. acinacifolia
Leaves spreading and often pale grey to blue grey (glaucous)....G. croucheri

Leaf edge is sharply serrated ......G. excelsa

Leaf edge is smooth throughout (Margin entire)....G. nitida var nitida

Leaves occur alternating on opposite sides of the stem (distichous), strap/flat shaped(lorate) without a shape edge on the bottom (keel)

Leaf surface smooth ...G. brachyphylla
Leaf surface rough (asperlous) or bumpy (tuberculate)

Leaf surface is rough (asperlous)

Leaf edge is wavy .....G. disticha
Leaf edge is straight ....G. pillansi

Leaf surface is bumpy(tuberculate) or rough bumpy(asperlous-tuberculate)

Leaves are spreading(patent) or curling downward (recurved)

Leaves are dark green and bumpy (tuberculate) ...G. nitida v. armstrongii
Leaves are blue-grey (glaucous) green and rough (asperlous) and bumpy (tuberculate) ....G.glomerata

Leaves erectly spreading

Leaf edge wavy .....G. carnita var. retusa
Leaf edge straight

Leaf tip(apex) square (truncate).... G. baylissiana
Leaf tip(apex) rounded (obtuse) or pointed (acute) G. carinata v. verrucosa

Plants With Stem (can be short or long)

Plants lying flat but with leaves growing upwards (decumbent), leaf skin smooth

Leaves shorter than 90mm .... G. bicolor v. lilliputana
Leaves longer than 90mm ... G. bicolor v. bicolor

Plants hanging(pendulous), leaf skin rough(asperulous) ... G. rawlinsonii

This key applies to adult plants. Juvenile plants often lack the defining features of their species like rough or bumpy skin until they are more mature. This page from wikipedia has a listing of leaf types and some diagrams showing the different kinds. This page has diagrams of the different types of leaf tip (apex) some of which are not covered in the wikipedia page.

xGasterworthia, xGasterloe, or xAloeworthia 'Royal Highness'

2012-03-05T08:05:00.001-08:00

I am unclear what exactly this plant is. Some hybrid either Gasteria X Haworthia or Gasteria X Aloe or even Aloe by Haworthia. It looks the most like a plant known by the cultivar name of 'Royal Highness'. On flickr it has been suggested that it is Aloe 'flow'

Adventitiousness

2012-03-05T07:49:00.001-08:00

Adventitiousness - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

In botany, adventitious refers to structures that develop in an unusual place. This part of the article discusses adventitious roots, buds and shoots, which are very common in vascular plants.

Kalanchoe marginata

2012-03-05T07:49:00.000-08:00

Kalenchoe Marginata

BBC iPlayer - How to Grow a Planet: Life from Light

2012-02-08T03:16:00.000-08:00

BBC iPlayer - How to Grow a Planet: Life from Light

An intriguing new series on the BBC about Plants Growing. Some very interesting visualizations of photosynthesis and stomata.