This isn’t a handful of pebbles or tiny butts. It’s actually a whole lotta lithops. An African native succulent, also called “Living Rocks”. These curious plants are incredibly slow growing and difficult to maintain in cultivation. Anyone who collects succulents will have a hit list on the number of lithops they’ve killed. These succulents are not to be watered during summer as they go into a deep dormancy. After the heat breaks and autumn begins, lithops will begin to flower, during this phase you can water them, but do it sparingly and only when the plants looks like it’s wrinkling. During winter, this plant will begin to grow a new pair of leaves, which grow from within the parent plant. DO NOT water during this time, as the new leaves get ALL of the water they’ll need from absorbing the older pair of leaves. If you’re lucky, two new pairs will grow out, essentially doubling your plants! After the new leaves grow and it’s spring, you can resume careful watering until summer when we begin this slow and tedious process all over again. #tylerthrasher #thrasherplantcollection #lithops #succulents #mesembs #africa #africaplants #handfullofbutts
So i have Lithops / Succulents related question to the tumblr-verse.
So as you can see that is my Lithops, i dont know what species it is i just got it from a gardening/hardware store, Bunnings if you are from Australia. Being from Australia, its currently winter now.
So from the stuff i read from the interwebs, it says to stop watering in winter until the new leaves come out in spring. The last time i water it was 2 weeks ago at the end of autumn/beginning of winter.
My question is, it is normal for it to look that wrinkly? Its still quite firm and not mushy so i dont think its rotting. Is it springing forth new leaves?
I’ve had it for less than a year and last year at the end of winter towards spring it split open and put forth new leaves but it was quite plump then.
i’m just wondering and concerned, I really like it. cactusmandan could you give some guidance?
Hi,
Doesn’t look too hot, so I’d probably take it out of the pot and remove all of the soil to inspect the roots. All the fine hair-like roots are totally irrelevant and can be torn off. The only permanent portion of the roots should be a small taproot at the base of the leaves. If this is nice and healthy, then the plant is in good shape and you can just pot it up again. Depending on the soil mix it came in, you might want to repot it into a different, very free draining soil mix. Something like 60/40 pumice or grit/topsoil would work fairly well. Perlite works in place of pumice, but I really dislike it as a soil ingredient. Once potted up, you can just wait for the old leaves to be absorbed and the new leaves to emerge before watering again. You might want to contact the folks at www.ozlithops.com for more advice specific to growing Lithops in Australia, since your climate is so different to mine.
