A blog for lovers of succulents and cacti
I discovered a white, sun-deprived pup in the bottom of a rootbound haworthiopsis.
I had intended to document the pup’s growth and recovery. I took several photos showing its transition from white to green. Unfortunately, while it was growing strong, it met an untimely demise. In the end, I realize I wasn’t that diligent in my picture taking.
The following is a short slideshow of how it fared. Click or tap for larger images.
Thanksgiving and Christmas cacti are plants of the genus Schlumbergera, a sub-classification of the family Cactaceae (which includes all cacti). These late bloomers are great to keep some color during the cooler seasons, as they generally bloom close to the holiday for which they are named.
These holiday cacti aren’t quite the same as typical ground-dwelling desert cacti. They are actually epiphytes—they grow symbiotically on other trees in tropical forests in south-eastern Brazil.
Holiday cacti are flowering plants that have flattened leaf-like stem pads, which grow from the tips of each other in a chain. The pads have areole notches along the sides and at the tips. They have been cultivated to produce white, pink, yellow, orange, red or purple flowers that sprout from the areoles.
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The most common problem people have when starting out with succulents is overwatering. Imagine a cactus in the wild. Where do you see it?—probably some sandy expanse, right? Succulents and cacti are typically desert plants, and as such they’re adapted to living in dry, arid environments. They are xerophilic, and aren’t used to receiving lots of water.
Use pots with proper drainage. Holes in the bottom of pots allow excess water to quickly drain. Porous materials like clay, concrete, and terracotta also wick away some extra moisture and are often ideal for succulent plants.
If your plant’s pots have proper drainage, then how frequently you water is more important than how much water you give them. Most succulents like for their roots to get a good soak, but have time to dry completely between watering.
Regular potting soil holds moisture well, which is great for certain plants, but for succulents and cacti you want a fast draining potting medium. If the soil compacts and doesn’t drain, then the roots sit in standing water and can quickly begin to rot. Once that happens, your plant’s health goes downhill fast.
Typically a good succulent soil will have two types of additives. There’s a non-organic component like coarse sand, perlite, turface, or pumice, which prevents compacting and creates spaces that allow for better penetration and aeration. Then, there are organic components like peat moss, bark, or coconut coir (shredded husks). The organic additions hold onto some moisture and nutrients to sustain your plants.
Premixed cactus and succulent soils are available for purchase, but even these can often be improved upon with soil amendments. For especially dry-loving plants you can make a “gritty mix” with almost no soil or organic components.
Using a marked pitcher or measuring cup can help you control how much water you’re giving your plants. This is especially helpful if you are using pots that don’t have drainage. How much you give your plant can vary a little depending on soil type and amendments, but generally you should give it about 1/2 as much water as there is soil in the pot. For reference, a standard 4″ clay or plastic pot has a volume of about a pint (so would only need about 1 cup of water), and a 5-6″ pot has a volume of roughly one quart (could require up to 2 cups of water).
You can measure the moisture in the soil before watering again. You can do this in several different ways depending on what works best for you
If you are the type of person who appreciates having a gadget for everything, or doubt your own assessment then check out soil moisture meters like this one from Amazon. There are several options available with extra features from around ten dollars.
If you can learn the rhythm of your plants, then you could avoid some worry by keeping your watering to a routine schedule. Typically potted succulents need to be watered weekly to once every few weeks.
Make sure to be aware that some succulents might need to be watered more or less frequently than others. To help stick to your schedule—and not worry about remembering if you watered your plants last weekend or the one before—you could mark your calendar or set a recurring reminder on your phone or computer.
Using a spray bottle could give you great control of how much water you give your succulents, and where you want it to go. Some people recommend misting your plants, but others advise against it
Here’s the issue, spraying the leaves and stems of plants can promote unwanted aerial root growth (hard leaved plants like haworthia/haworthiopsis are less susceptible to this). Water on the leaves could potentially cause mildew. Also, when misting you’ll probably have a tendency to want to water more frequently, and might risk not allowing the soil dry enough
If you do choose to mist your plants, aim for the base of the main stem and let the plant do its own job at getting that moisture to the leaves, after all that’s a succulent’s forte.
Many succulents enter a dormant period in the cooler seasons, when the days get shorter. During dormancy, plants will generally grow slowly, and not require as much water. If you were watering once a week you might end up only needing to water once a month. Keep an eye on their health and try to wait until the plants start to look a little thirsty (just barely deflated or shriveled). Some choose to skip or minimize the dormant overwintering phase by keeping plants indoors and using the aid of grow lamps.
Some succulents are extremely sensitive when it comes to getting too much water. These include Lithops (Living Stones), Mesembs, and several species of cacti. One of the first succulents I killed was a Titanopsis that was sharing a pot with some less sensitive plants.
With these plants its advised to wait until they start to look a little shriveled, or with lithops water only when the tops start to get a little bit concave.
It’s better to err on the side of too dry, than too damp—Shriveling plants can often be brought back to life with some water and attention, but when root rot starts, there’s usually no going back without some cutting and re-potting.
Are these tips helping you? If so I hope you’ll like or share this post. Do you have any tips of your own?—Please share them in the comments below
Pumice is one of the best soil additives to use when planting succulents and cacti. It absorbs and holds the right amount of water and nutrients, while creating space for aeration and fast drainage. Pumice can be better than perlite as an additive, because it doesn’t have the same tendency to separate out of the soil and float or rise to the top during watering.
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Sometimes your plants just aren’t getting enough light and need a little extra care. Most succulents prefer a minimum of 6 hours of bright, direct sunlight a day. When plants aren’t getting enough light they start to etiolate or stretch out in search of more. This causes the stems to elongate, leaving large gaps between the leaves, and losing the distinct rosette shape many succulents have.
Another instance where you might want a setup like this is to encourage and speed up propagation by having better control of growing conditions.
Combining two items can make a world of difference and your plants health and growth.
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The other day I took a quick trip over to the Lowe’s garden center. Initially I was just going in to find a drill bit for a future project—hopefully I’ll be adding some drainage holes to some cheap ceramics and glass that will make great succulent planters. I’ll let you know how that goes in the future.
Of course I had to go look and see what they had in stock. I’m hunting for some Lithops or living stones—as usual nothing like that to be found. I sighed about the coloring crimes that were committed to these cacti and walked away.
In most Lowe’s and Home Depot garden centers, if you make your way toward the back you’ll often find a clearance shelf. These are usually plants that have been damaged or need some extra TLC. I feel like I always end up looking for plants that need saving.
My city was recently devastated by hurricane Florence. Any of the poor little plants that got left in the outdoor garden center didn’t have much of a chance. There were pots without dirt, pots without plants, and pots with mushy, rotted, and dead stuff.
Here are the few plants I ended up with bringing home for my succulent salvage
Total cost $3.50
I unpotted all of the plants and knocked/raked most of the soil off the roots with a bamboo kabob skewer.
There’s actually some pretty good roots left on most of these, which is usually not the case when it comes to clearance—Often they end up over there because of root rot, but even those can sometimes be saved.
Because of the high humidity in my area, and my tendency to occasionally get carried away with watering, I like to add extra soil additives to improve drainage. Here, I’ll mix up some Miracle-Gro Cactus, Palm and Citrus Potting Soil Mix with some pumice that I bought a bulky bag of.
Putting the succulents in the pot with varying levels of dirt can help make up for differing stem lengths.
The campfire plant didn’t actually even have any roots on it when I took it out of its pot. There was just a bit of dead stem, which I snapped of before dipping it in some Garden Safe TakeRoot rooting hormone.
This was the end result. It’s not my proudest arrangement, but it will suffice as an intensive care unit while these guys strengthen and recover, and hopefully they will fill out in short time. After potting everything up, I gave them a pump of Miracle-Gro Succulent plant food, and put them under the grow lamp in my etiolation station.
It was labeled generically as haworthia asstd./haworthia spp. I’ve since been told it may likely be haworthiopsis coarctata, and a stop over at Wikipedia certainly validates the opinion that it is a haworthiopsis of some kind.
The plant looked pretty crowded in its pot, and I wanted to separate some of the pups for propagation.
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Whether we’re talking about new plants you just brought home or one of your favorite plants starting to look sickly, a good safety measure can be to quarantine succulents.
quar·an·tine
kwôrənˌtēn/ noun
a state, period, or place of isolation in which people, plants, or animals that have arrived from elsewhere or been exposed to infections or contagions are placed.
So here’s the thing, pests and other problems can spread quickly among a close population, and big store shelves full of plants make excellent breeding grounds for them. When you bring home some new little succulent or cactus, you don’t really know what else you might be bringing in with them. Surely you’ve inspected the plant before buying it, just to make sure it’s in good health, but there could potentially be pests, insect eggs, fungus, or bacteria in the soil that you won’t see. That’s why I recommend quarantining your new plants for a short while to make sure there are no unwelcome guests.
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Taking the precaution to sterilize soil can kill off insect eggs, fungi, and bacteria that could potentially cause harm to your plants.
In my previous post, Why All My Succulents Almost Died and What I Did To Save Them, I discussed needing to re-pot my plants because of over-watering, root rot, and an infestation of mealybugs. I didn’t want to run into the same problems with bugs and bacteria. This time, I decided to sterilize the soil first.
If you were potting some plants and ran out of fresh dirt, you can sterilize the old soil to make sure no contaminants are living in it before reusing. Because I was weary over my recent bout with pests, I was using a fresh new bag of Miracle-Gro cactus and citrus mix the when I decided to try soil sterilization, but you can also use this method to freshen up old soil before re-potting.
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A little over a month ago nearly all of the succulents on my porch started showing signs of deterioration. It started with one pot at first—my most recently acquired echeveria. I watched in dismay as the problem spread to my other succulents over the course of the next two weeks. Leaves were falling off, and my previously fat little plants were shriveling up. After a thorough inspection, there were a few of the most common issues happening at the same time. Here’s why all of my succulents nearly died:
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