Down but not out

Aloe striatula has been considered one of the very few aloes that would cope with UK winters. Up until this winter that has proved to be true, not only did it get through without damage but flowered.  After a few years you tend to take it for granted that this is one plant you don't need to worry about.  This winter has proved that wrong and like so many plants the early cold and long periods of snow proved too much for it.

I have two large clumps, one planted in the front and one in a pot i the back. Here is the clump in the front during the snow:

At first everything looked good,  but as things warmed up the plant went down hill and now looks like this:

While there are one or two green leaves left, they are on the way out and the plant is pretty much dead.  Anyone who grows succulents in the UK is used to plant collapse like this and knows that you never rule a plant out until you have given it a chance to come back from the roots.  Looking this evening and I found this:

There are between 6 - 8 new shoots starting already, so it is going to be a nice bushy plant in the future. Sadly it is going to take a good few years to get back to its former glory and I doubt I will be seeing any flowers for years as well.  But we have to be thankful for the little things, and at least now I know to cover it during snow!

A little shot

I mentioned at the start of the year that one of my resolutions was to grow more manfredas and mangaves. There are limited varieties of manfreda you will find in the UK and the only common mangave you find is mangave macho mocha, which is a lovely plant.  At this time of year it tends to be green but as the sun warms up purple spots form giving it a distinctive colour. If you control the water you can get an even better look, this one belongs to the agave nursery:

The variegated version of this plant is mangave espresso and has white edges to the leaves.  I was lucky enough to track one down last year and it is the plant all my friends are desperately watching hoping for pups. How does the saying go, a watched kettle never boils.  It seems that posh coffee makers are not so shy and I was thrilled to find this the other day:

As you may have noticed, I have a tendency to remove pups as soon as I find them and it took all my resolve to leave this one where it was.  I won't remove it until it's a bit bigger,  although there is one very anxious perspective owner waiting for news. Something tells me this little one is going to receive even more attention than its mum.

Texture

Looking though my photos and at my plants as they get re-potted, I noticed how drawn I am to texture. Quite a few of the close up photos I have shown here has been because of the texture and often it is the texture that I like as much as anything else. It is only recently that a friend showed be that an important part of identifying agaves is feeling what seem like smooth leaves, showing if it is truly smooth or has a sandpaper finish.

Texture can take several forms; ridges, bumps and filaments that give the plant a hairy look.  One of them in the furry category is echeveria setosa a nice plant commonly found in the UK.  There is a blue form which is perhaps even better.

I find that as well as looking at my plants I like to touch them,  I think all forms of gardening are about all your senses, and it's not enough to just look these beautiful plants, you have to touch them as well.  This one at least is most definitely stroke-able, with others you have been be a lot more careful if you want your hands back undamaged!

Probably the best plant description ever.

There are two running battles in my house.  The first, as I have mentioned before, is between my OH and the plants. I would like to think this was for my attention, but sadly it has more to do with her wish to be able to walk around without being stabbed or scratched by plants.  The second is between the agaves, aloes and echeverias for the top spot in my affections.  In terms of top plant, aloes have just leapt into the lead. The reason for this sudden change is this stunning plant

Aloe viper, from the stable of Kelly Griffin, and having seen one in the flesh it is now top of my wish list. I will let Xeric Growers describe it as it is their plant "This new Aloe Hybrid is one worth waiting for. The large highly contrasting raised red bumps are very distinct and set this great new offering apart from previous hybrids. We selected the name 'Viper' for this cultivar because it just looks like it is bleeding from every orafice. The raised red bumps appear to be eruptiong from the bright green leaves as if the plant had been injected with a deadly venom and is about to explode." As you can see they have gone for the soft, gentle approach to describing this plant!

If you live in the USA order one now, if for no other reason than you will make me very jealous.

And so the fun begins

It's spring, so what else should my mind turn to but sex.  Don't worry I am still talking about plants, as the echeverias are now getting into full swing with more flowering every day and so I am starting to think about what crosses I to try this year. Last year I went a bit mad and tried countless different ones, each flower stem had a little bit of paper attached with the cross neatly written out.  Even with this it was difficult to keep track and I only end up germinating a couple of crosses and sadly they were not as successful as my first attempt.

This photo shows one set of hybrids, the back row contains the parents echeveria lilacina on the left and deresina on the right. The attributes I liked about were the colour of lilacina and the larger flowers of deresina.  The front row shows a couple of the resulting hybrids and while the colour is good, the flowers are the small ones from lilacina. It seems it is not uncommon for certain varieties to be dominant in the resulting hybrid. Someone who knows a lot more than me recently told me that echeveria agavoides tends to dominate in hybrids and it has proved true for me.

These echeveria deresina x agavoides sadly look like very plain agavoides, they have even lost the nice colour the parents had. So as I look at the plants coming into flower, this year I am putting a bit more thought into what I want, I am a bit like a kid in a candy shop.  I'll have a nice big blue rosette

But those flowers have to go,  maybe some nice big yellow ones:

Or perhaps take the good flowering lilac one

and add some hardiness from one of the few UK hardy varieties.

As space is the perpetual problem here, this plant echeveria rosea is an obvious choice as resulting hybrids, even if not that different in looks any increase in hardiness to other varieties would be a benefit.  I dream of a garden full of echeveria hardy to UK winters.  So while I wait for the flowers to open, and get my paint brushes ready, I will give some more thought to which plants may work.  Who knows I may even do a bit of reading to increase me chances.

The sempervivums are back

Assuming they have not turned to mush, which is a big assumption after this winter, many succulents look great all year.  I find it reassuring to be able to look out at the agaves and yuccas at any time of year and see them looking good.  It is not so true for other plants especially the alpines.  Over the last couple of years I have collected quite a few sempervivums, and noticed there is a huge difference between the varieties in the way they cope with winter. Some hardly change at all, while others shrink right back leaving a clump of dead leaves.  Come spring those that have not shrunk back often change colour giving some welcome spring hues. To celebrate their return here are a couple of my favourites.

This pot of sempervivum ciliosum is filling out nicely and hasn't shrunk back at all.  Lots of new offsets as well, so should look great in a few months.

This one is sempervivum lively bug, can't help smiling every time I read the name. It has gone a very good maroon colour right now, sadly this will not last long and it will be green for most of the summer. It is lovely and furry.

I keep meaning to do something creative with these little plants, I love the blog posts showing the amazing ways people use them in pictures, walls, wire frame animals. Who knows maybe this will be the year I finally get around to it, although I wouldn't hold your breath.

A little bonsai echeveria

One of the things I love about this time of year is bringing the plants out of their winter protection, repotting and tidying them up. There is something very satisfying about looking at your plants after doing this, even if they're not at their best the promise is there. I can potter like this for hours, often using tweezers to remove dead and damaged leaves.  My OH watches this with some bemusement as I like to keep the pots immaculate and yet am perfectly happy to leave the rest of the garden scruffy, (and my voluntary contribution to cleaning inside the house is lets just say limited).

The most extreme form of my tidying are attempts to sculpt or bonsai plants. This started through the lack of space and needing to keep plants from growing too quickly.  Most plants I just try to slow down,  but there are a few where this has resulted in plants growing considerable smaller than usual. One I have been playing with over the last couple of years is an echeveria glauca brevifolia. This is basically a small form of echeveria glauca.  Here it is in 2008.

Every year I repot it, trimming the roots slightly to allow it to stay in the same pot.  This is it today:

The largest head is about 2cm which is about a quarter of the size of the plants I have planted out. It gets better every year with the head becoming more defined. I feel I now need to decided what to do with it.  Sadly there are more heads one side than the other as you can see from this next photo.

So I am contemplating cutting out the middle row of heads, as it is these that are very one sided.

As I have said many times before, I can rush things like this only to regret it afterwards.  Maybe it time to actually leave one alone to get on with it.  If I stopped all pottering with the potted plants then the rest of the garden may stand a chance of actually being looked after.