Summer!

Adenium obesum "Rik Ni Ran". All the beauty of roses and none of the disease and stench.

Adenium crispum x obesum

Adenium obesum "Santa Claus"

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Above, this store-bought Adromischus cristatus started putting out flower stalks as soon as night temperatures stayed consistently above 20C. When healthy, this plant is as stiff as the al dente version of the pasta that it resembles. It grew about three new leaves after it was taken out of the peat-based disgrace that commercial nurseries use. But as soon as the blooming cycle started, the leaf growth stopped.

My precious pot of Adromischus herrei (left) also started to bloom. One terrifying day as the flower stalks appeared, A. herrei dropped two leaves. But that seems to have been that, probably from the three previous days of rain. It has since firmed up and the stalks are still growing so it's probably alright, for now.

On the other hand, the leaves of the Adromischus maculatus that detached in transit from Arizona, have sprouted new growth. It only took three months! So, in the pot, there are a total of six new plants. This species is not as sturdy as A. cristatus but definitely less finicky than A. herrei. All three, however, have to be watered carefully. You can not treat them like adeniums. That is to say, you can't kick them over and expect them to survive out of the pot until you get around to repotting (this is something adeniums can actually do).

Below, this Adenium obesum "Fear and Surprise" bloomed very early in May. By the time the other adeniums on the bench started budding out, this one was already nursing one seed pod.

After three years, someone finally discovered how to pollinate one of my gasterias. Above is the fruit of that labour.

The plant above is a pair of lithops grown from seeds. They were definitely supposed to be something else but since they clearly are not conophytums, it's wild guesswork what kind of lithops they actually are. 

The plant on the left is another mesemb, a caudex-forming Trichodiadema bulbosum.  Trimmed drastically in early spring, it only took a couple of weeks for its thick foliage to grow back and even bloom. They also turned out to be easy to root--just stick the branch into a pot and forget about it. 

Below is a blooming Eriosyce occulta. The blooms start out looking like a mealybug infestation--just white fuzz. If you panic and spray it with alcohol, like I did, don't worry. It ignores the attack and goes on its merry way to become a flower. This specimen came to me with a fruit still growing atop the cowpie. The seeds were viable and germinated within two weeks (in the winter, on a heat mat) but the two seedlings that survived got lost in the move from indoors to the spring outdoors. 

Keep randomly checking this site. I have no plans of sowing any more of whatever seeds I will get this summer--I will be giving them away, especially this E. occulta. 

Eriosyce occulta in bloom

Ooofff. She is pink, this blooming Hassadee "Red". It is blooming in waves, now on its third.

This plant above is Tacca chantrieri, or Black Bat Plant. This has been in the TINZ since I got it and this is the happiest it has ever been--outside in the hot summer sun, partly shaded by screen and watered nearly every day. Oh it won't do anything else but just having more than two crinkly leaves is already a record-breaking performance. I credit it for not dying.