Leaf bowl

Whenever I have a loose succulent leaf, or a cutting (intentional or unintentional), it goes into the leaf bowl. It started out as a white plastic pot in the garage, but when I moved it inside to get more warmth I switched to an 8-inch Bonsai pot. In the last week or so it has stretched beyong the boundaries of the pot into seven littler pots. The Bonsai pot is really too nice to get stuck with this duty and I've been thinking of converting it into a smaller version of the 10-inch Montage. But this is what I had starting today, demonstrating various stages of success.

At the upper left is the Bonsai pot. The five narrow leaves at the top are Little Jewels that seem to be developing roots. The next leaf is one I took off Lola just a few days ago and is in better shape than this image conveys. Next is a jade leaf that has been in there for a long time and doesn't seem to be doing anything. Just below that is the spiked aloe sprig, same story. The bottom part of the bowl is miscellaneous leaves with not much going on. At center is the pup I found buried in the Haworthia Cooperii pot I received yesterday. The white-tipped shoots below that and on the left edge also are from that pot. I'm letting those dry out and will plant them in 2-inch pots in a few days. The variegated square fell off of a Crassula perforata variegata about 10 days ago and I hope it eventually sends out roots. Nothing yet.

To the right is a 4-inch pot with String of Bananas pieces I got from my nephew. I think there are some little roots developing and I'm trying to keep those nodes in contact with the soil.

At lower right is a small bowl with three more Little Jewel leaves and one other random one. All are developing roots so I gave them their own bowl.

In the rectangular plastic tray are, from left, a piece of the Crassula Capitella Campfire that wasn't rooted well in the main pot, an unknown leaf that is sprouting, the jade cutting that finally seems to be developing roots, a cutting from one of my nephew's larger plants that has a little plant developing on the end, and the small pup from the Haworthia Cooperii that I divided today.

The leaves do not need water. If they root and produce a little plant, they get their moisture and nutrition from the leaf until it is shriveled up. After I took this photo I did spritz the jade cutting, the Crassula plant, and the String of Bananas. The first two are plants, not leaves, and the last one doesn't have thick leaves to draw from. I think the little roots growing from each of them would like to find at least a little bit of moisture. My theory, it might be totally wrong.

As mentioned, I want to put the Bonsai pot into production with real plants, so I 3D printed two small trays to hold the 2-inch pots and transferred all the leaves to the rectangular tray, without soil. I get all my succulent information (or a lot of it) from Australian YouTubers, and Kat @SucculentGrowingTips says the soil is not necessary at this stage. She waits until both roots and tiny leaves develop before putting them in soil, and only one of mine meets that criteria now (upper right in the rectangular tray). If some of these plants keep developing, they might end up in the bonsai bowl for real, although if I rely just on what is shown here it might lean heavily toward Little Jewel propagations.

Pups and 3D Printing

I need pots and saucers for all of the little plants I've been accumulating, and I've been trying to find alternatives to just buying more stuff on Amazon. Three Haworthias occupy ceramic coffee cups with holes drilled in the bottom, and I just got a 3D printer. I printed two versions of the pot shown below, this first one (with the new Sedum Jelly Bean) with Jade White filament.

The other version of this pot was printed with "white-brown stone" filament. As it turned out, in bright light that means light pink with some flecks. In lower light, it does sort of look like the description. That pot got put to use today. I split up the Haworthia limifolia Fairy Washboard, which had three pups (two huge, one tiny) growing out of it in its little coffee cup. The big pups are shown here, and the small one is out of sight to the right.

When I dumped the cup, only half of the soil came out with the plant which isn't surprising since I planted it just a month ago. The roots appeared very healthy, but the soil was still moist a week after the last watering, which concerned me. The risk of using glazed ceramic instead of terra cotta is it does not dry out as fast, which could cause problems with succulents. I also noticed that the big 10-inch ceramic planter (aka "The Montage") isn't drying out very fast. I need to be especially careful with ceramic. This is what the cup dump looked like, with the big pups on the left and the little one on the right.

It took a little bit of effort to snap off the big pups, but I had courage from watching an Australian manhandle his haworthias on YouTube. Here is one of the big pups in The Montage between the Ice Plant and a Cuban Oregano cutting. I stuck the CO and a rosemary cutting into The Montage just to fill up space and I wasn't sure they would stay there. When I tug on them there is some resistance, so they might have rooted already.

Here are the main plant in the 3D-printed pot, the little pup in a 2-inch plastic pot, and the other big pup planted back in the ceramic cup. I also stuck a stray chunk of root into the little pot. After watching the Australian YouTuber, it seems like any little chunk might sprout into a new plant.

The Haworthias are on the front lines of my 3D printing efforts so far. I am using three coffee cups now, all with Haworthias, and I 3D printed saucers for them. The saucers I had been using were all too tall and hit the cup handle. Also, I broke a saucer for one of my small ceramic pots, and replaced it with a simple 3D print. Maybe as I get better I will replace the saucer with one that has a blue rim, like the original. Unfortunately the Hawortha attentuata Concolor (coffee cup) and the Haworthia Zebra (ceramic pot) have not produced any pups yet. I've had them less than a month; yes, I'm impatient. I received and potted the Haworthia Cooperi yesterday in a coffee cup. This is one of those that has the translucent leaves. It came in a 2-inch pot and it looked like they took a plant from elsewhere and jammed it in there. I found a couple pieces under the main plant, and these are now drying and I will try to plant them. Here's Cooperii's portrait in its coffee cup.

As I get more filament colors, I will be printing different designs in the 3.5- to 5-inch range. For anything bigger than that, I will continue to go with real terra cotta or ceramic. 3D PLA filament is not designed to last long when exposed to moisture, so I did hit the pots and saucers with some clear Rustoleum enamel to perhaps slow down any deterioration.

Unboxing

Every time I unbox an order from an online succulent store, I say, "Never again." The carelessness of the Post Office and the fact I can't see something before I buy it makes it seem not worth the hassle. But the fact remains that online stores are the only places where I can get varieties that aren't carried by Home Depot or Walmart. The local stores sometimes have some nice, overpriced plants, but the selection is not tremendous. I tried a new online store this time, Ramsey Succulents of Vista, CA. Compared to Mountain Crest, they are by far cheaper and the quality seems the same if not better. Mountain Crest probably has more of the real rarities (which often aren't in stock), but Ramsey has a lot of what I'm looking for right now.

Today I unboxed 16 items from my Ramsey order of 14, cost $42.57 with free shipping over $40.

The plant pots did not have ID stickers, one of my pet peeves, but I was able to figure out with (some) certainty what they all are, except for the two extras (#6 and #10). From top left, row by row:

1. Sedum Jelly Bean, seemed like something basic I had to have to do planters.
2. Echeveria Lilac Mist, lots of rosettes.
3. Echeveria Cubic Frost, weird leaves.
4. Echeveria Blue Curls, some leaf damage
5. Sempervivum Strawberry Kiwi, my first Chick Charms (five more varieties on order from Garden Crossings).
6. I'm not sure what this is. I thought it might be the Graptosedum Alpenglow, but there's one pictured in the next row that I'm more sure of. My guess is it is some other type of Graptosedum or Graptoveria.
7. Echeveria Compressicaulis, a more upright Echeveria.
8. Echeveria Setosa Var. Deminuta, a fuzzy Echeveria.
9. Echeveria Chroma, shifting colors with the seasons.
10. I'm not sure what this is, except it is an Echeveria.
11. Crassula Sarmentosa, more of a vining habit than other Crassulas.
12. Crassula Capitella Campfire, will turn bright red with enough sun.
13. Graptosedum Alpenglow, colorful, can trail.
14. Haworthia Cooperi. This plant was jammed into that 2-inch pot, and I was able to pull off a pup and another small piece as I was replanting. They are in the leaf bowl callusing over.
15. Aeonium Floresens, my first Aeonium. It seems like most varieties get very big, so it may take over the garage someday.
16. Sedum Firestorm, colorful like the Sedum Shooting Star I got recently, but bigger.

I pulled one each of the Lilac Mist and Alpenglow rosettes and stuck them in the 10-inch planter (aka "The Montage") I did last week. The Cubic Frost has three distinct rosettes, and some of the other pots also have multiples. I'll wait until Spring actually arrives before I think about splitting them. In addition to the pup pulled off the Haworthia, I also threw a few loose leaves into the leaf bowl. My previous order with Mountain Crest, it seemed like half the leaves fell off the Pachyphytum compactum Little Jewel. A large number of them now are developing roots in the leaf bowl. I'm not sure I want eight Little Jewels, but that's where this is heading.

Here are the two Crassulas, Sarmentosa and Campfire. The world's most powerful mirrorless camera (Canon R5 Mark II and RF 100mm macro lens) really shows all the details, including the dirt on the leaves from the planting process. I had to pull a weak stem off the Campfire, but I stuck it in a little pot and we'll see if it grows. I'll post images of the others as I get to them.

[For those interested in such things, Photoshop's focus bracketing processing isn't always perfect. There's what I can only call ghosting around the leaves in the Campfire image at 5:00 and 8:00. This affects the part of the background which is out of focus at first and later is supposed to come into focus but can't because of the blurred object in front of it. Photoshop's "Remove" tool can be used for additional processing, but I decided just to leave it.]

The Strawberry Kiwi arrives at a sad time for my Sempervivums. The Coral Reef and Cherry Glow are definitely dead. The Orion had two rosettes, with one now dead and the other barely holding on. The unidentified ones I call #2 and #3 perhaps are not dead, but they don't look good. The Arachnoideum might be OK under its webbing, but I really can't tell. The remaining four Sempervivums are still in the greenhouse and were fine at last check. My current theory on the Semperpocalypse is the ones that apparently froze were not as dried out as they should have been to withstand a temperature of 6F. I saw a video with Debra Lee Baldwin (noted succulent author) recently where she said that Sempervivums are hardy, "if dry."

I've said this before, but that should be it for succulent purchases for a while. That's not to say there aren't a few things on my wish list: Graptoveria Fred Ives (huge, prolific), Ghost Echeveria (ghost white), Echeveria Purpusorum Dionysos (variegated red), Sempervivum Virgil Ford (colorful, prolific), Lapidaria margaretae - Karoo Rose (weird), Echeveria Rainbow (an even more colorful Perle variety), Crassula Buddha's Temple (stacked leaves), Greenovia aurea variegata (like an Aeonium, but unique in their own way), and Kalanchoe Humilis Desert Surprise (purple stripes). It's hard to find them in stock all at the same time at Mountain Crest or Succulents Depot, and they have minimum order sizes to get free shipping. Mountain Crest is out of stock on so many things on my wish list that I'm $27.59 away from free shipping on what is in my cart. At Succulents Depot (who I have never ordered from), my shopping cart currently is $16.22 short of free shipping.

In non-succulent news, both types of pepper seeds (bell and mild Jalapeno) have been the highlight of the seed starting room. I read that peppers take a long time to sprout and become plantable, but with the heat mat they started coming up within a few days. The basil, thyme, coleus and onions have come up but are not shooting up like the peppers are. The Bergamot (Bee Balm) looks OK but I have to kill aphids every few days. There is a marigold flowering in the seed room that also attracts aphids on occasion. It is a never-ending battle. I just started three 2-inch pots of broccoli. Around April 1, I will start tomatoes in the seed room. I'm probably a month away from turning the heat back on in the greenhouse and direct sowing carrots, a few beets and peas. A few weeks later will be the lettuce, cilantro, green onions, sunflowers, STRAWBERRIES, and maybe a potato in a grow bag.

I have been trying to propogate aloe and Cuban Oregano. The little aloe pots look sick and I may stop trying until the greenhouse is in operation. Some of the Cuban Oregano cuttings are a bit yellow and probably need a hit of nitrogen, but I'm holding off on fertilizing anything because the garage is crowded enough as it is. I gave petunia pot #2 and the geranium cuttings a shot of fertilizer Feb. 15. They really need bigger pots now, but I don't have anywhere to put them. Besides the aloe, Cuban Oregano and all the succulents, also taking up a lot of space in the garage are multiple peppermint pots.

Greenhouse season is fast approaching. In early April before doing any direct seeding, I want to get a cubic yard of compost to spread on top of the planters and to supplement the soil mix in the hanging baskets and pots/grow bags. Succulents have been a diversion during this down time, but it will get real busy soon.

We're Gonna Need a Montage

I was in Billings today and as has become my custom I stopped by the usual places to look at succulents. The local shops Roots and Gainan's have some good-looking plants, but I'm not going to pay $12 for something without an ID tag. There was some type of Haworthia with the translucent leaves at Gainan's I was tempted by, but there was no tag. At this time and place, the best stores to get succulents with ID tags are Home Depot and Walmart, and the ones I bought topped out at $5.97.

I started at Home Depot and found something that was on my wish list, Sedum adolphi Shooting Stars in a 3-inch pot. On a whim I stopped at Target next to see what they had, and the answer was, "Just go to Home Depot." Then it was the fruitless trips to Roots and Gainan's before I went to the first Walmart. (Yes I went to more than one.) There I found the ruffled Echeveria Neon Breakers (3"), Crassula perforata variegata (2"), and something called Senecio haworthii Cocoon Plant (3"). Neon Breakers was on my wish list, the Crassula with its stacked, variegated leaves is similar to some that are on my list, and the nearly-white Cocoon Plant was a target of opportunity. The genus Senecio also includes succulents like String of Pearls, but the Cocoon Plant looks nothing like that.

I was going to limit myself to four plants today, but at the second Walmart I found an Ice Plant, identified as Lampranthus deltoides but supposedly now known as Oscularia deltoides. Apparently there are many varieties from different genuses called Ice Plant, so this isn't the one on my list. But the online description sounds pretty good. Supposedly this one will spread (or trail out of a basket) and produce masses of flowers in the spring.

Unless I give up on my three frost-damaged Sempervivums, I am out of four-inch pots. I just ordered a 3D printer so I'm not going to buy any more 4-inch pots, and delivery is scheduled for next Wednesday. (First on the print list after Benchy/Boaty is a white spiral pot, 4 to 5 inches. I already bought some Rustoleum clear enamel to use as sealant.) I decided to put the Neon Breakers in one of the new 6-inch squat pots, and I had to rough up the root ball for it to fit. I still have four more squat pots, but I decided to do a montage of the other four plants in another recent acquisition, a 10-inch ceramic planter. I wasn't going to plant it up until spring, but there was a need for its services. All four of these plants look like they will be easy to divide and use in future montages.

The first image is the Neon Breakers. In the second image, clockwise from upper left are the Ice Plant, Cocoon Plant, Shooting Stars, and Crassula.

All of the places I went to today have small planters (5-8 inches usually) with 4-8 varieties of succulents. They are packed in much more tightly that what I did. The ones at the local stores are pieces of art and are priced accordingly. The ones at the national retailers are a way to buy an assortment of plants and a planter for relatively cheap. I have considered getting one of these and using it as a starting point for an arrangement, or perhaps pulling individual plants out. But you run into the problem again of no ID tags. Maybe this spring if I'm trying to fill out a container, I will get one.

I used focus bracketing for both images, but rather than have the camera step through the focusing, I manually selected the focus points. Nine points worked well on the planter, and I was using a tripod to maintain the ISO at 100. The Neon Breakers is already out in the garage and I shot hand-held, which at night required an ISO of 1600. I used four focus points and I could have added a couple more closer to the camera. After I water it in a few days, Neon Breakers will get a better portrait taken.

For now the planter is in my office. It will only get morning sun, so I need to find a place for it in a garage south window under the grow lights. But I'm running out of space. I've got four pots of parsley that have been an aphid battlefield for months. They take up half a shelf under a set of my newest grow lights.

"Parsley, I'm gonna have to let you go."

Somewhat hardy

I last checked in on the greenhouse last Wednesday before going on a trip. I thought maybe the plants would benefit from an absence of my helicoptering for a few days. All looked well in the garage this morning, but in the greenhouse it was a different story. The three Sempervivums that are relatively new and were in 4-inch pots are frost damaged. Of note is that the older plants in 4-inch pots that have had longer to acclimate to the greehouse are OK, as are the two planted in 6-inch pots.

All of these Sempervivums are supposed to be cold hardy to -20 or worse. The coldest it was in the greenhouse during my absence was +6 last Wednesday night and +10 the following night. (It was -5 and +7 outside on those nights.) But I do realize there is a difference between a plant that is rooted in the ground that has had a full growing season to get established, and one that until recently was in a climate-controlled California greenhouse and is now in a small pot sitting on a bench in an unheated greenhouse in Montana. The three are now stashed in the relatively-warm garage and I hope they revive from the roots in a few months. If they don't come back, lesson learned.

Feb. 28 update: Unless they surprise me by growing up from the roots, I don't think two of the three are going to make it (Cherry Glow, Coral Reef), and I'm not sure about the third (Orion). There are three others that aren't showing the same extent of damage but look a little wonky, so I pulled them out of the greenhouse today just to be safe: #1, #2 and #3. That leaves four in the greenhouse: #4, #5, #6, and the Budai Mountains.

In more positive news, already there are a few sprouts from the pepper seeds I put in a starter on a heat mat last Wednesday, and some thyme even has come up in that short time. I will have lots of mint and rosemary plants from which to choose come planting time. The basil has been less vigorous, but I have a couple of seedlings I should move to 4-inch pots. I should sprout some more, along with coleus (only one vigorous seedling so far).

I received six new 6-inch terra cotta pots that are half the height of regular pots. Interweb sources say that many types of succulents prosper in shallower pots, with exceptions like aloe. I repotted Perle von Nurnberg in a squat pot, and put the new unknown Echeveria from Trader Joe's in the freed-up 4-inch green pot. I drilled a hole in the 2.5-inch terra cotta that formerly held that Echeveria and inserted a cutting of some unknown succulent I got from my nephew. Here are those three in order of height. The saucer for the squat pot is barely big enough to hold it, which I knew from the Amazon reviews. With succulents, I'm usually going to be taking the pot out of the saucer when watering so the excess can drain away easily, so I figure it will be OK. My recent watering session with the new Jade plant was an adventure and required draining for several hours before it was safe to put back in the saucer.

The new Echeveria has not been watered. Perle was watered last Wednesday. The unnamed cutting had several days to dry before I stuck it in dry soil today. None of them will get watered for a week. The sprouting pot, which I mist every few days, now has about 20 items in it and no sign any of them are doing anything. I'm coming around to the succulent way of doing things, i.e. letting thing completely dry out, and then letting them dry out a few more days, then drowning them.

The deer at the greenhouse can't wait until I put some things in the window boxes that they can eat. Just three more months. I hope they like marigolds and mint.

On the road

We don't have a Trader Joe's within 500 miles so we usually find one when we are in a larger city to pick up snack nuts and cheese. They also sell plants. I would have bought the $15 planter which is overstuffed with a variety of succulents, but it would have been challenging to transport it on the plane. I settled for this little Echeveria for less than $4. The 2.5-inch terra cotta pot is just for show; it didn't come with a hole (Update: There is one now). It is rooted in a plastic pot that fits inside the terra cotta.

No indication of variety but it has red tips and looks sort of like the Elfstone. But it has bigger leaves and probably will be a bigger plant.

Perle and Red

I happened to be in Home Depot today so picked up the Echeveria Perle von Nurnberg I thought I bought four days ago. Here are the imposter Red Sky and Perle side by side. Perle is by far the largest succulent I have planted in a four-inch pot, but I didn't have any six-inchers today and I didn't want to go up to eight.

Echeveria Red Sky and Echeveria Perle von Nurnberg

These two are closely related and do (or did) look almost alike. Red Sky seems to be a lighter, more reddish color, but that may have developed in just the past few days from getting a lot more light (grow lights and sun) than on a shelf at Home Depot. I think the plant on the right is the same one I had in my hand four days ago, and I recall the color of the two plants being exactly the same then. It will be interesting to see what the two look like next week after Perle catches some rays. Anyway, Perle can be crossed off my bucket list.

R U Ded?

When I was unpacking the Sempervivum order January 29, a loose little ball rolled out. With the webbed fluff on the leaves, apparently it came out of the Arachnoideum (#1) pot. It looked dead, but after my recent reading on succulents I knew not to assume that. When in doubt, stick it in some soil and see what happens.

The first three images I took of it were out of focus, which made me a bit peeved. I said to myself, "Self, you have the most powerful mirrorless camera in the world, a matched 100mm macro lens, Photoshop full edition AND a sturdy tripod." So I looked up how to do "focus bracketing" and blended 20 images (f/5.6, 0.8 second, 100 ISO) of this thing just to make sure I had it in focus. It is. These are two versions of the same blended image with different cropping. I still don't know whether it is alive, but I'm giving it every opportunity.

Twenty images is enough to get this little ball in focus, but the depth of field is still rather narrow. The camera will take up to 999 images. That would take a LONG time to stack in Photoshop.

It is not always necessary to use the in-camera focus bracketing, or to take dozens of images. Photoshop will take two or five (or 999) images and attempt to align and stack them. I took two images of this Sempervivum (#2) yesterday. As it turned out, one had the central rosette in focus and the other had the left and right offsets in focus. It wasn't intentional, but Photoshop allowed me to salvage the situation. The framing of the two images was not identical, but Photoshop took care of that by aligning them. If you look closely, there is still an out-of-focus zone between the front and the middle. Maybe three images would have been ideal, but given just two images it is better than either of the originals. There are other apps besides Photoshop that process focus bracketing and might be faster, but for me Photoshop is more than powerful enough.

The Next Day: I shot my newest cactus Mammillaria rhodantha aka Rainbow Pincushion using two different focus bracketing settings. The first one was 10 images with two steps in between (yesterday's was 20 images one step apart). The second was eight images with three steps in between. I think the second shoot had slightly more depth (8x3=24 is greater than 10x2=20), and a few more of the back spines were in focus. The danger is if there are too many steps between the exposures, there will be little bands that are out of focus. That isn't a problem here, and more experimentation could reveal when it would become a problem. But not today. I used backlighting from a window on this to emphasize the spines. To get all the spines in focus, I might have to go 12x3 or 8x4, something like that. This is the second image (8x3):

If you look closely, this cactus has fluff around the base of the spines, and I have seen some photos where the fluff is much thicker. It also has a long blooming season starting in the spring. I'm looking forward to getting perfectly in-focus images of fluff and flowers.

Allium

Last September, I found five bargain allium bulbs at Walmart and stuck them into one of the greenhouse beds. According to the information I can find, they should sprout sometime in the spring. Mid-February is still winter in Zone 5a, but it has been in the 50's outside most days, and it gets above 80 degrees in the greenhouse if the sun is shining. Four of the five allium started poking their heads above the surface a few days ago, and today they look like they are serious...but there is no sign of the fifth one. Either it knows it is still winter, or it rotted in the ground. (Feb. 24: The fifth allium is up.)

Allium is in the onion family, as are chives. One of the chive pots also has decided it is spring, and I decided it may as well get some sun.

I trimmed back the two sage plants and am hoping for a revival in the spring. If they revive, I will dig them up and put them elsewhere because they are right in the middle of my planned tomato/pepper bed. The three garlic are growing, the two buried mums seem to be OK under the straw, and there is still no word from the onion seeds.

Regarding my recent succulent obsession, I took portraits of all the Sempervivums in the greenhouse today. Again. Rather than fill up blog posts with these images, I'm creating static pages for each variety. Unless and until I lose ambition, the goal is to have static pages for ALL of my plants, with pictures and care guides. The link for the menu page "Plant Photos and Complete List" is located near the top of the right-hand menu. The first page completed is for Budai Mountains, which is pretty much my favorite Sempervivum now with the little offsets/buds that fall off, roll away and establish new plants. Here's a sample image.

Oops

I wasn't real pleased with the last online succulents order. I don't even blame Mountain Crest Gardens. It's just a reality that there is going to be some carnage when you have the USPS treating the package like a basketball. Although I still have some doubts about the Graptoveria Lovely Rose, I think all 12 of the plants will live and eventually thrive. However, there are enough stores in the Billings area for me to find most of the plants I want, and I can pick them up and look at them before I buy. If soil gets spilled out of the pot in transit back to my house, that's on me, not USPS.

I got some cabin fever today so headed north with a list in my head. At the top was Perle von Nurnberg, which may be the most popular Echeveria due to its "pearlescent pink and purple tones" as Mountain Crest says. I also wanted to get a Haworthia and a cactus. My first stop was the Laurel Walmart and I found nothing except a very dry example of an Echeveria Neon Breaker, which has frilled, colorful leaves. Interesting, but I decided to pass. Before heading to the Billings Walmart to see if they had a better selection, first I stopped at Home Depot. That's where I found Perle von Nurnberg, not just a 2-incher but a big 3.5-incher. I was getting ready to put it in the cart, but I saw another plant that I thought looked slightly better. I took that one instead, and also bought a new 6-inch pot for it. Imagine my surprise when I got home and the tag said "Echeveria Red Sky." It's a big, nice-looking plant but I don't get to cross Perle off my list yet. Or do I? Interweb sources indicate Red Sky is a variation or is at least closely related to Perle. They did look extremely similar to each other in the store.

Mountain Crest gushes, "Echeveria 'Red Sky' is a dazzling succulent hybrid admired for its velvety, rose-toned leaves that glow with soft pink to coral hues under sunlight. Its broad, slightly cupped foliage forms a graceful, symmetrical rosette that resembles a blooming flower, with each leaf blushing deeper along the edges in full sun or cooler temperatures." OK, maybe I accidentally hit the jackpot. After potting, Red Sky went into the garage window and is parked next to Lola. They enjoy grow lights and a south-facing window. With plenty of light, Lola's color has shifted from mostly green to pastel in just a few weeks, and hopefully the same will happen with Red Sky.

I had four other acquisitions today, and all went into my warm office. The Haworthias at Home Depot looked good. I mean, really good, so I got two. The first is Hawortha attentuata Concolor, and the next is Haworthia limifolia Fairy Washboard. I decided to pot them in the coffee cups I drilled. They aren't supposed to get big, but may produce offsets that will fill the 3-inch cups.

Home Depot also had a good selection of cacti, and I chose Mammillaria rhodantha aka Rainbow Pincushion. It adds some color to my cactus collection, which now numbers three, all Mammillaria genus.

And finally, an impulse purchase, Crassula rupestris, String of Buttons. It can provide company to my Jade plants (Crassula ovata). This time I promise to follow instructions and not water most of the plants I bought until next week, but this one seemed like it needed a drink. So I doused it and, I swear, it already has perked up from when this picture was taken just a few minutes ago.

My office window sill is now officially full and I don't contemplate adding to it. There are three Crassula, three Haworthia, three Mammillaria cacti, a Thankgiving cactus, and one lone little Sempervivum that might be dead. Maybe it is just playing possum to stay in the warm office and avoid getting put in the cold greenhouse.

For the garage, I still have the following on my list: Echeveria Perle von Nurnberg, a variation of Perle called Rainbow (variegated stripes of vibrant pink, blue, and yellow, currently out of stock at Mountain Crest), Echeveria Chroma (very colorful), Echeveria purpusorum Dionysos (red/orange/purple), and maybe something weird like Lapidaria margaretae Karoo Rose (blocky looking, pastel colors, blends in with the quartz in its native Namibia).

I am not searching for more Sempervivums to join the 10 at the greenhouse because I already have five Chick Charms® Sempervivums on order from Garden Crossings as part of my spring petunia order: Appletini, Berry Blues, Cosmic Candy, Gold Crown, and the very popular Gold Nugget. The documentation isn't real clear about the rosette size except Gold Nugget (5 inches), but some of them might be huge. In any case, they all should produce a lot of offsets and can fill up a big pot. They don't arrive until mid-May so I have time to figure out what pots to use. Or what raised bed.

I have plenty of room for the various succulents I have acquired, but I'm wondering what happens if I have any success propagating them. They might take over the greenhouse this summer instead of what I have planned. Who needs tomatoes anyway? And come cold weather, only the Sempervivums can stay in the unheated greenhouse. The rest somehow have to fit into the garage and the house, or I may have to start an aggressive gifting campaign. Now is the time to call dibs on a Red Sky offset.