One Becomes Two and So On.....

I really had never been a fan of Lithops, but I bought a group of three last year. One died, so I was left with two, now one has developed into two plants so I'm back to three. The new thing that has helped me is that I learned the watering system for them. Since the plant is made up of so much fluid, you must be careful and not water like other succulents or cactus. When the Lithop is developing into a new plant it is receiving its moisture from the old leaves and no watering should be done, otherwise they will rot.

One of the old leaves is that little shriveled reddish piece on the right at the base of the plant in the photograph below, at one time it was about the size of the new plant. But no water was given during this time.

Still add one or two to your collection, you might surprise yourself and be able to grow them. To find out more information about Lithops check out these blogs, Gaia Nursery, Lithopsland, and Lithops Stories

Copiapoa barqentisis

This is another cacti that I purchased from Luther of Kara Nursery at the last OCSS sale that was held at Portland Nursery. Currently it has two flower buds, there were no flower buds when I brought it home, so this is very exciting. 

Copiapoas are an interesting group of plants that come from the coastal desert regions of Chile. Shape is globular, later often columnar, clumping and forms large mounds gray to green in various shades. Spines are various in amount, length and having whitish wool at the base of the spines. Flowers are short tubular, yellow to light yellow in color which is a good identifying feature for this genus. Some of the species have fragrant flowers. Copiapoas should be protected from excessive heat and sun in summer.