Cactus Blog 

Bonfire as it got colder last night at the company summer party. If only summers in Berkeley were warm we wouldn’t have needed a bonfire. On the other hand, if summers in Berkeley were warmer we wouldn’t have had a bonfire.

Barbra brings us Echinopsis babies every year, and here we see the parent plant in, what shall we call it???, Full Bloom. Yowza!

Queen of the night, first bloom 2013. Parent of the babies I have for you.

Ohcrackohcrack has a fondness for cactus. Maybe a bit too much fondness.

Pamelalovenyc likes the color pink. Nice Saguaro.

No photo for this next tumblr picture. It’s NSFW and an inappropriate use of cactus.

Outdoor Arizona has some good access to the Saguaros in Summer. Classic!

Grand Ave., Oakland
Saguaro cactus in bloom

Nice technique!

Evelyn Ave. Berkeley

Beautiful street cactus! You’d think car doors might damage it a bit, but you’d be wrong.

More bright and colorful California Poppies, Eschscholzia californica.

“Orange King”

“Thai Silk Fire”

And my favorite, “Red Chief”

10th Street, Berkeley

Cotyledon in bloom, and an Aeonium

From National Geographic’s Vintage National Geographic Tumblr

Giant century plant in Southern California

National Geographic | February 1958

That thing is huge!!!

There are three different Mimulus Hybrids in this photo. Don’t you wish you could plant three different hybrid Monkey Flowers in your garden? You can! We now carry a varied selection of 4″ mixed Monkey Flowers, i.e. Mimulus Hybrids.

This is kind of a lazy post for a Sunday. I should probably say something about these particular plants. Instead I will leave you with this link. Links take work, too, you know! Admittedly not a lot of work, especially that link, which is a lazy link, but not so lazy that I didn’t provide it for you to enjoy. To the zoo!

Everyone agrees this is not my “best” one. I think they don’t like it. But it’s my crappy terrarium. Look at all those colors! Gold sand, orange beads, orange butterfly! It’s like a fantasia from the 70s and I was there so I should know. Next time I’m using purples.

Tanacetum densum
Evergreen Perennial

Sun: Sun
Water: Moderate
Size: 6″ tall

Feathery grey leaves form a dense groundcover. Small yellow flowers pop up 6-12″ above the foliage in spring. Ideal for coastal gardens – can’t take heat. Hardy to below 0° F.

Grayson Street, Berkeley

Aloe striata and an Aeonium

Friday whippets are calm whippets.

Adenium arabicum

Rare with a large caudex base up to 2 ft. across with long stems, bonsai style. Keep dry in winter; Hardy to 35F.

From the Arabian peninsula, these want as much blasting sun as you can give them. With good air circulation and some heat you should be able to ward off the spider mites. For the rest of us – watch for spider mites.

Lazy whippet.

Epiphyllum in bloom just in time for the July Fourth holiday. It’s doing its own fireworks display!

I know this is not a regular feature of this blog, but baby caimans are too cute not to share.

Too!

Yacare Caimans, Brazil
Photograph by Luciano Candisani
National Geographic Photo of the Day

Aaagghhh!!!!

We’ve had a lot of fun with all the very colorful South African daisies. They are so easy to care for, what with not doing much at all for them besides watering less than you might think, and deadheading too. Here are the latest blooming Osteospermum at the nursery.

“Sunny Xena”

“3D Double Purple”

“Soprano White”

“Spider Purple”

Ever wonder what to do when you’re hanging around San Diego? Well, you could meet famed succulent author and gardener Debra Lee Baldwin. Bring the kids! It’s a fun day for everyone.

Debra Lee Baldwin, and her new book, Succulents Simplified, will be at the San Diego Horticultural Society on Monday July 8.

The meeting starts at 6:00 p.m. at the Surfside Race Place at the Del Mar Fairgrounds. Admission for non-members is $10. She’ll be signing her new book, Succulents Simplified.

And then there’s a followup at Roger’s Gardens in Corona del Mar (Orange County) at 9 a.m. July 27. Free.

Aeonium subplanum
8th Street, Berkeley

Here we see the traditional mixing of the succulents and the palm tree. It’s a Berkeley tradition!

Delosperma

Heterotheca villosa

California Native
Herbaceous Perennial

Sun: Full Sun
Water: Low
Size: 1ft

Low growing native perennial with grey-green leaves and hairy stems. Bright yellow flowers in summer. Makes a great groundcover for dry areas! Hardy to below 0F.

Echinocereus reichenbachii buds are very spiny.

And the blooms are very purple!

This is what I can tell you about Echinocereus reichenbachii. The species is quite variable and there are a number of subspecies that are also sometimes listed as separate species. I believe this one is the ssp. baileyi. Baileyi is from the Great Plains grassland, found in Oklahoma and Texas. It could be ssp. fitchii from Southern Texas and Mexico, but I don’t think so.

These will generally start off solitary and eventually fill out with as many as 12 stems for a single plant. The cylindrical stems will be fairly erect, green, and as tall as 10″ x 4″ diameter.

Cylindropuntia prolifera in bud.

And a fancy photo of the rose-like bloom against a b/w background of cholla stems. (edited in Aviary).

With Jordan and Rikki at the labyrinth.

Echeverias in bloom at the Embarcadero Center.

Photos filtered through Instagram.

Lycopodium squarrosum

Not a fern, though called a fern, it is a club moss. It’s also rare, which means its also expensive. But it creates these amazing long tassels spilling down in all directions, splitting along the way and creating more branching as it goes. Nice!

It will do best in a moist shady spot indoors, like a fern, but it will handle drying out for short periods. So its flexible! Very nice!

The photo is a pretty close up close-up.