Happy Unboxing Day

It was yet another unboxing day, and this one went better than the last one. It was a Mountain Crest Gardens order of nine plants in seven pots, and there was not one loose leaf left inside the box after I got all the pots out. I think that is a first. And the box arrived two days earlier than the tracking showed, although eight days from order to receipt still isn't that great in this day and age. But compared to other unboxing days, I have nothing to be mad at USPS about.

Here are the new arrivals and how I envision potting them today. From top left:

• The Honeycrisp Twist trio of 'Gold Nugget' (obscured), 'Appletini' and 'Cosmic Candy' goes into the 3D-printed black pot. All are Chick Charms Sempervivums.
• The huge Chick Charms Sempervivum 'Berry Blues' gets a regular 6" terra cotta.
• Chick Charms Sempervivum 'Lotus Blossom' is assigned a green 3D-printed pot.
• Haworthia retusa f. geraldii 'Star Cactus' (not a cactus) is in a short 6" terra cotta.
• Echiveria pulvinata 'Frosty,' Kalanchoe humilis 'Desert Surprise,' and Echeveria 'Black Prince' each get a 4" terra cotta pot.

When I printed the black pot I thought it would be ideal for the 'Black Prince,' but it's a 5-incher and I need it for the trio. Maybe when I break up the trio, the 'Black Prince' (who should be called the "Dark Burgundy Prince") can claim his rightful place.

The Haworthia is described as [large] on the web site, and indeed it is. It looks like it could be divided into at least five separate plants. In the trio pot, the 'Appletini' is already sending out runners. The 'Gold Nugget' is probably the most popular of this group and you can't even see it in the above image. Unlike the other Sempervivums in this order, it will not get huge; its fame is due to its color which changes with the seasons, culminating in a bright gold. The 'Berry Blues' rosette already is gigantic. The 'Desert Surprise' is unlike anything else I have. The two Echeverias are nice but seem puny next to these behemoths. And I haven't even mentioned the 'Lotus Blossom,' which looks incredible in photos on the Mountain Crest site. All of the plants, especially those with a bit of fuzz on the leaves, are dirty and dusty from the trip. We are entering growing season for all of them and they should brighten up soon.

Here is a slightly better view of the 'Gold Nugget.' I got these three in one pot because I wanted each of them and they were cheaper this way. I want to split them apart ASAP but I don't really have enough BIG pots right now. I'm thinking more 6" pots might not be enough; I'll probably need more 8" bowls for these monstrosities.

'Berry Blues' is 5 inches across, not including the runners, and is expected to get a lot bigger than that.

I really need to stop ordering succulents. When next winter approaches and I try to wedge everything back into the garage, it might be challenging... But am I really going to sit on my hands when Echeveria runyonii 'Topsy Turvy' becomes available at Mountain Crest in a few weeks April 2nd? And of course I need to order 8-10 plants to get free shipping.

Later: The potting up didn't go entirely to plan. The trio had an intact root ball and was too tall for the black pot. It went into a tall pot I drilled a hole in months ago and hadn't used yet. It is a temporary situation because 'Gold Nugget' needs its own pot.

The 'Lotus Blossom' went into the 6" short terra cotta, and the main part of the Haworthia was shifted over to the black pot. I didn't use the green pot. I pulled seven pieces off the Haworthia and stuck them where I could find a spot, including various bowls, a little 3D owl head planter, and two in a 3D pot that was the only thing I brought in from the garage. It went next to the kitchen window with most of the other Haworthias. This is my second experience with Mountain Crest and can attest that they ship their succulents DRY. I didn't water anything except the one I brought indoors, but I will make the rounds tomorrow and check everything.

Even Later: I remembered that I had a brand new, unused 8" terra cotta at the greenhouse, so I moved the 'Berry Blues' into it from the 6". I will shift the 'Appletini' from the shared tall pot to the 6", leave the 'Cosmic Candy' in the tall pot, and move the 'Gold Nugget'...somewhere TBD. Maybe a new 6".

I have figured something out about 3D printing plant pots. Printing anything over 5 inches doesn't make sense versus buying something at Walmart. But I will keep printing small pots for the dozens of Haworthias I'm going to end up with. As I said yesterday, I pulled seven pieces off the recent 'Star Cactus' acquisition. I already divided the 'Fairy Washboard' into four, and and the Cooperi definitely has two pups that could be harvested. I wish the 'Zebra Plant' would spit out some pups, but it hasn't joined the action so far. There's also four Jade cuttings that will need pots eventually, and at least four leaves from assorted sources are sprouting. I have a lot of Pachyphytum 'Little Jewel' leaves that have been sending out roots for a while, but finally one has developed little leaves. This is magnified, it's not even 1/4 inch yet.

Customer Service

With the exception of the two Echeveria Purpusorums, the recent USPS shipment from The Next Gardener was disappointing. The Pachyphytum 'Apricot Beauty' was almost dead when it got here and is no longer with us except for one tiny rosette that I cut off before the stem rotted away underneath it. I was just going to move on and never order from them again, but they sent me an email asking for a review on that item. I gave the item a one star, as it deserved.

Today, Sunday evening (?), they reached out to me and offered to replace it if I sent them a photo of the carnage, which I did. We will see what it looks like when it gets here. (Unfortunately, the replacement also is coming by USPS.) One reason I was just going to move on without contacting them was I don't think all the damage the Pachyphytum (and the 'Rainbow,' and the 'Linda Jean,' and the 'Buddha's Temple') sustained was during transit. I wasn't interested in receiving more damaged plants. If all this company did was send out Purpusorums, they would get five-star reviews every time. But if I saw any of the other four plants in a store, I would look for ones in better condition.

I've got two more plant orders outstanding. There is a Sempervivum-heavy order from Mountain Crest Gardens that is supposed to arrive Thursday, 10 days after I placed the order. That's a long time to spend in a dark box, even for a Sempervivum. If anything looks crumpled from this order, this time I will initiate a re-order because I paid extra for order protection. And sometime this month my strawberries will arrive from Burpee's. The greenhouse is ready to go when they arrive.

On a happier note, the 'Powder Puff' cactus has multiple blooms and I'm having success with focus stacking using Zerene Stack. See my two overly-long blog posts on how I decided to go with Zerene. One reason I have a little bit of confidence in Mountain Crest Gardens is I got this cactus from them.

Final toll

The final count is in from the Semperpocalypse. None of the six Sempervivums that were damaged by the sub-zero temperature on Feb. 19 survived. The other four that were subjected to the same conditions still look fine.

I thought three of the damaged ones might make it, but over recent weeks they continued to deteriorate. I thought I could see some green through the webbing on the Arachnoideum, but I don't see it now. I will stick the remains of these three in 2-inch pots in a corner somewhere and announce if any miracles occur, but right now there are new Semps on order and I need their pots.

One reason I was reluctant to give up on the damaged Semps was the little dry ball that fell out of the shipping box on Jan. 28. I decided not to throw it away and today it is the only surviving sibling or descendent of the Arachnoideum.

There is some debris that I haven't tried to remove for fear of damaging the webbing, but the webbing is much thinner now than before. I've posted this "before" picture several times but it's worth comparing this one from less than six weeks ago to today's image. It almost looks like it came out of a cocoon. The plant is currently 1 1/4 inches wide, and was only 7/8ths of an inch in the older image.

My current Sempervivum inventory includes the relatively new 'Strawberry Kiwi' (Chick Charms), the four survivors of the Semperpocalypse, and the little Arachnoideum. The plants on order include five Sempervivums of the Chick Charms line, developed by hybridizer Chris Hansen of Garden Solutions in Michigan. Receipt of those will get me to 11 varieties.

I also took some other photos today. This one is of the 'Powder Puff' cactus I posted about a few days ago. That bloom has faded and this is a new one. Photographing this flower exposed another deficiency in Photoshop's processing of focus bracketing. It kept bringing the complicated background into focus and ignored the bloom. This is a single image, and I cropped it tight because most of the cactus is out of focus. After an exhaustive several-minute internet search, the two programs that floated to the top as alternatives to Photoshop for focus bracketing are Helicon Soft and Zerene Stacker. Both have trial versions and the licenses are reasonably priced, so I might get one of them. For test results, see my regular blog.

This one didn't have a tag when I acquired it as part of a cheap Home Depot bowl, but I'm sure it is Crassula 'Ogre Ears.' The top half was very yellow when I got it last week, and it is still yellow. But with light and the tiniest bit of liquid fertilizer it is gradually greening.

Yesterday I posted an image of one of the Echeveria Purpusorums sending up a stalk. The other one is stalking also, although not quite as tall yet. My best guess is it is a flower stalk and not a new rosette. Images on the interweb show very tall flower stalks coming out of these plants. If I'm wrong about it being a flower, I'll edit this post and pretend I was right all along. [This image processed in Zerene Stacker.]

I also said one of the unknown Echeverias from the Home Depot bowl was sending out two stalks, probably flowers. Here it is:

And finally, here is the Aeonium 'Florens.' It has added some color since I've been bombarding it with light for the past couple weeks. The second image is the one I posted March 13 and it was much more green.

Also today, I finished loading compost into the greenhouse planter beds, and I had almost none left over. I estimated pretty well on what it would take to fill the grow bags and pots, but I filled the planter beds to the brim and they took a lot more than I thought they would. Fortunately. I've had nightmares since Monday on how I was going to get rid of the excess compost. I'll have 2-3 buckets after I finish sweeping out the truck, which is a manageable number.

The long-range forecast shows lows in the 20s several times in late March and early April. I think engaging the heater at 41 degrees on April 1 will allow me to plant onions in the greenhouse and move a bunch of plants out of the garage. I picked 41 degrees because that is as low as the new heater can go without an external temperature controller. I'll set the controller for the old heater for 36-38 to act as a backup in case the new one fails. I'm going to do a test to see if I can run both heaters at once without blowing a circuit breaker. The old one showed it can maintain the temperature well above freezing even if it is below 20 outside, but I don't trust it.

Alien

One of the intriguing things about succulents is the multiple ways they can reproduce. Several of these involve making clones of themselves. I've only been collecting succulents for a short time, but it started with a Jade plant that had three stems. One of the stems was damaged, so I lopped that part off and stuck the top into soil. It took more than a month, but eventually it developed roots and now seems to be sending out top growth.

But with many succulents, you don't need a stem to make a clone, just a leaf. I have tried to sprout Jade leaves, but have had no success yet. The Pachyphytum 'Little Jewel' plant lost a lot of leaves inside the box during shipping. About 10 of them are sending out roots, but no new leaves yet. This image shows an unknown leaf that has developed both roots and little leaves. Maybe it will provide clues as to its identity as it grows up. This is just 1/4 inch across, but it has grown noticeably in the past few days.

The recent plant order was disappointing with the damaged Echeveria 'Rainbow' and the death's door Pachyphytum 'Apricot Beauty.' What is it about Pachyphytums? They don't seem to ship well. But I have no complaints about the two Echeveria Purpusorums from that order. They are progressing from nice to spectacular. Succulents send out stalks, sometimes new rosettes and sometimes flowers. If it is a new rosette, it can be chopped off, stuck in soil, and grow as a clone of the old plant. I'm not sure whether this Purpusorum is sending up a rosette or a flower stalk, but it reminds me of the movie "Alien." You know the scene.

This Purpusorum is the centerpiece of the Bonsai Bowl. It is the only one of the six plants in the bowl that has an ID. Two of the unknowns also are sending out stalks. On the right, the one I am calling Gratosomething has a new rosette growing from one side. At upper left, the one of the presumed Echeverias is sending out what might be a flower stalk.

Later that evening: I was doing one last sweep through the garage before lights out and noted that the other Purpusorum (which has its own pot) also is sending up a stalk, and the mate to the green Echeveria (located in the Home Depot Bowl) has not one but two stalks. I also I noticed this green leaf in the Montage Bowl between the individual Cocoon Plants, which are very white. So I dug it out, and found little leaves and roots attached to the big leaf. Exactly what I want to find. Because of the color I'm not sure it is a 'Cocoon Plant,' but now it is in its own 4-inch pot in my office to await further developments. Internet research indicates 'Cocoon Plants' always have a fuzzy white/gray covering, so I'm going to guess that it is something else that fell in there.

A few days later I pulled leaves off a number of plants, including a couple from the 'Cocoon Plant' that were partially buried. Those leaves were fuzzy white on top but green like the above image where they had been below the dirt. But the leaf in the image is entirely green and it hadn't been buried. I dunno. I have to wait for it to grow up.

Dirt

It took a day and a half to mix all of my dirt, excuse me, "growing medium" and fill the various pots and baskets. We were getting high winds this afternoon so I didn't finish spreading compost on the planter beds, but that shouldn't take long. This is what the compost load in the back of the truck looked like yesterday as I got started. I'm certain the guy at Rocky Mountain Compost gave me more than a cubic yard.

I tried to be precise in the early going to get a handle on how much each size container was taking, but after a while the measuring became more casual. In the image below, the three small grow bags at right marked with a green post and most of the hanging baskets (not pictured) got the strawberry/petunia mix, which was Promix and compost with vermiculite. Most of the containers shown here got garden soil and compost with some Promix and vermiculite. The other mix was the same as the previous one except I used perlite instead of vermiculite. That went into the two barely-visible small grow bags marked with two posts at lower left and most of the other relatively small containers such as the clay pots.

The planting beds got/will get straight compost, and I probably will mix in some vermiculite as I'm raking them. I'm going to have a little bit of compost left, and my hope is it will fit into my five buckets.

The large 15-gallon grow bags are dominating the middle of the above scene. I'm planning on moving one of them outside of the greenhouse to the side, and one to our house. I was relieved to find out that I could pick up a 15-gallon grow bag loaded with dirt...dry dirt. If they were waterlogged, I doubt it. A few of the other grow bags also will make it over to our house, but it will be this crowded in the greenhouse for a few weeks at least. BTW, the dead-looking plants in the back row are the mums, which were liberated from their holes a week ago. There is some new growth.

The mini greenhouse/shelving on the right contains the mint and rosemary which have been staying alive in the unheated greenhouse. It hasn't gotten below 30 outside in the past eight days. Add six degrees for being inside the greenhouse (and maybe a degree or two for being in the mini), and they have not been exposed to freezing temperatures. Since my AC Infinity app failed March 14 I don't really know how cold it has been getting in there. But I got a second Elitech temperature/humidity unit today and I will know from this point forward, AC Infinity be damned.

Outside the greenhouse, I placed this Home Depot oak barrel and filled it with the compost/soil/Promix/vermiculite mixture. I did water it down to expose any air pockets that would cause major settling, so there is no moving this one without taking the dirt out.

As soon as I finish spreading the compost on the planter beds, I'm going to turn on the heat to 40 and plant 75 onion sets. And with that, the growing season will be underway.

And so it begins

I've been diverted by succulents the past few months, but now it is time to get the greenhouse ready for our artificially-lengthened growing season. I was looking for bags of garden soil on Google last night and found a sale at Ace for 0.75-cubic foot bags, $2.50 each. Usually these are at least $4.50, so I ordered 15 and picked them up today. Monday I will pick up my cubic yard of compost and a few other supplies, then spend Tuesday doing my four different soil mixes and filling up the planters, pots, grow bags and baskets. The four mixes are:

• Strawberries and Supertunias in baskets, grow bags and pots: 45% Promix, 45% compost, 10% vermiculite.
• Greenhouse planter beds: 90% compost, 10% vermiculite, spread 2 inches on top of the existing soil.
• Most other pots and grow bags: 10% Promix, 40% garden soil, 40% compost, 10% vermiculite.
• With some pots and grow bags (potato, 'Velveteen Aromatic' ™, thyme, and rosemary), I will use the previous mix except substitute perlite for vermiculite. Perlite has less water retention but still loosens the soil.

I calculated it all out and came up with 1 cubic yard of compost, 16 bags of soil (I already had one), and six cubic feet of Promix which I bought on sale at Walmart months ago. When I calculated how much garden soil I would need to fill up the greenhouse beds last year, I nailed it with fifty of the larger 1.5-cubic foot bags, so there's at least a slight chance that I will be in the neighborhood. I estimate I will have about five buckets of compost left over, which I will give away or eventually use.

I spread out all of the grow bags inside the greenhouse to see how much room they will actually take up in the open space on the north wall. Three of the five big 15-gallon grow bags are shown here, but not all of them will be permanently inside the greenhouse. I also have one 10-gallon, two 7-gallon, and seven 5-gallon grow bags. They will all be put to use.

With all these grow bags, I don't think I will have to buy any more big pots. If I need something, a couple of the 5-gallon buckets might get holes drilled in them. It will be crowded inside the greenhouse for more than a month, but eventually at least six of the larger pots and bags will move to our back yard. There also will be 15 hanging baskets inside until the weather warms up, then 10 of them will be moved to hooks on the outside of the greenhouse or to our house. I hope the inside of the greenhouse will be a sight to behold in late May just before everything starts moving out.

All told, I will have about 50 different plant varieties at the greenhouse and in our yard this year. That doesn't include any of the 50 varieties of succulents that may end up in the greenhouse or outside on our porches. As soon as I get the soil mixes to their intended locations, I'm going to turn the heat on in the greenhouse and start planting. With an average last frost date of June 9, that would be more than a 2-month jump on the growing season. My most-often repeated greenhouse saying is, "We will see."

March 23: I got my compost today. The guy with the Bobcat was not shy about filling up the back of my truck bed. I figure it is more than a cubic yard, so I may have way too much. On the other hand, the expensive bags of vermiculite ($10) I got at Walmart seem awfully small. I may have to adjust the mixes for more compost and less vermiculite.

On the home front, I cancelled the Garden Crossings order of Supertunias and Chick Charms Sempervivums due to travel plans in May making it uncertain whether I would be here to unbox. The Sempervivums can live in a cold, dry box for weeks, but that is not the case with tunias. I will buy Proven Winners Supertunias locally, and (after complaining about the viability of online plant orders recently) I just put in an order with Mountain Crest for Chick Charms and some other stuff on my wish list. So I will be reacting to another unboxing in about six eight days.

I looked over the selection at Home Depot and Walmart today, and it's not all the exact same varieties I already have but it is looking very similar. Mountain Crest has the stuff they don't. This is the order:

• Echeveria pulvinata 'Frosty' - velvety coating.
• Echeveria 'Black Prince' - leaves are dark burgundy, almost black.
• Haworthia retusa f. geraldii - translucent leaves bent back like thumbs.
• Kalanchoe humilis 'Desert Surprise' - purple blotches and stripes on the leaves. My first Kalanchoe.
• Chick Charms 'Lotus Blossom' - pink, crimson and creamy white leaves.
• Chick Charms 'Berry Blues' - blue, pink and purple at different times.
• Chick Charms 'Appletini' - apple green center with dark tips.
• Chick Charms 'Cosmic Candy' - fine white cilia (fuzzy).
• Chick Charms 'Gold Nugget' - a mix of vibrant red, hot pink, and gold tones throughout the year, the most famous of the Chick Charms line.

Unknowns Part 2

I split apart the Home Depot bowl I purchased yesterday and replanted the nine rosettes. The pots in the first image are two 3D-printed plastic pots flanking the original 5-inch terra cotta. I don't have a saucer for the terra cotta, so borrowed one from a 6-inch pot for the photo. Maybe it is my imagination, but the Crassula 'Ogre Ears' (I've decided it can be nothing else) on the left already looks more green than it was yesterday. I don't think the yellow tinge is normal and maybe it sat in a box with no light for a while. I'm almost sure the plant on the right is a pachyphytum. It is darker than the Moonstone but the shape of the leaves and the look of the plant are very similar.

The 'Ogre Ears' will go into my office next to the other Crassulas, and everything else stays in the garage.

As planned, I added one of the three Sedum-looking rosettes to the Montage Bowl. I took the 'Velveteen Aromatic' ™ out of the Montage to make room, and it had a little root on it so I stuck it into one of the other CO pots. I know CO roots easily but it's always nice to have confirmation.

The Bonsai Bowl received one of the apparent Echeveria rosettes and the so-called Sedum. I moved the Purpusorum to make room and it is now the centerpiece of the bowl.

The original bowl was dry, but not overly so. I'll wait a few days to water the pots. The Bonsai Bowl is still slightly moist from a watering a few days ago and I'll wait until it is dry. The Montage Bowl retains moisture too well and is still moist from a watering a couple weeks ago.

The Pachyphytum 'Apricot Beauty' from the recent order continues to deteriorate and lose leaves. The main stem does not look healthy. I chopped a tiny 1-inch rosette from a side stem and am trying to root it. I'm not going to complain to the company, I will just never buy from them again.

On the greenhouse front, I put in an order for a yard of compost today and will pick it up Tuesday. To get ready, I did the following today:

• Dug up the two mum pots from the beds and filled in the holes.
• Dug up the two sage plants and stuck them in pots. Plastic pots are good enough until I figure out what to do with them. And see if they are still alive.
• Got rid of the straw that covered the beds all winter.
• Rounded up all my buckets in an attempt to figure out my situation for excess compost. My calculation is I will have a little bit left over. I might be able to give some of it away, but I probably will have to find (buy) 2-3 more buckets.

After I dug out the mum pots, here is the southwest bed aka the new onion bed. At right are the five alliums, which look good but show no sign of flowering. The three pots are chives which have been going strong for a few weeks. I will plant about 60 onions where the pots are sitting now, and I'll fit the bunching onions in somewhere.

Here are some mint and rosemary sprouts that "voluntold" for the cold hardiness test, and at right are the two sage that I dug up. The mint on the left is looking a bit wilted, but not from the cold. It was in a 4-inch and dried out, so I put it in a 6-inch and gave it a drenching. The 10-day forecast says lows will be not much lower than freezing. And of course, at night the greenhouse is usually six degrees warmer than outside.

With the sun shining today, it was 84 degrees inside and the fan was blasting. Somehow I've lost contact with the greenhouse AC Infinity controller in my phone app, but the controller still has its programming and the fan still starts when it is supposed to. The immediate problem is I lost the ability to do 24-hour temperature monitoring. I have ordered an additional Elitech temperature/humidity monitor like the one I have outside, but the downside of that is it is not connected to the internet and I won't have real-time monitoring. I have to go over there and download the data to my laptop.

I'm tired of technology that does not work, so decided I could live without internet connectivity. (Remember last summer, the internet-connected fan failed and everything roasted for about a week. Then in October, the heater thermostat failed one night. Fortunately it wasn't cold enough to freeze everything before I could obtain a replacement.) The cheap thermometer that came with my heater also failed recently, so the new Elitech replaces that also. If I had to do it all over again, I would get a cheaper fan with an analog temperature control. I ordered a second heater that will run on a separate thermostat and electric outlet, and it will be set a few degrees lower so it only kicks in if the other one does not. Hopefully I don't blow a circuit breaker if it doesn't work as planned and both heaters are on at the same time.

Bowl of the Unknowns

I'm going to have to get used to the idea that I will know what some of my succulents are, and I will have only a general idea about others. I take pictures so I can keep track of the which specimens have IDs and which do not and should not be allowed to vote. Today I picked up a 5-inch pot with six different succulents in it at Home Depot today for less than $6, $2 off regular price. It seems there are six different types, some with multiple rosettes for a total of nine distinct pieces. $1 for each type, plus a short terra cotta pot, bargain.

My best guess clockwise starting at upper right is Echeveria, Sedum, Pachyphytum, Sedeveria, Graptopetalum, and a Crassula in the middle. If that's 50% accurate, I would be surprised. I'm going to disassemble this and put a rosette of "Echeveria" and "Sedum" in the Bonsai Bowl, and one of "Sedum" in the Montage Bowl. I might give the "Crassula" and "Pachyphytum" their own containers, which leaves four pieces to go back into this bowl. The Crassula appears to be the variety 'Ogre Ears,' but the coloration is off perhaps from the stress of being jammed into this pot. Another reason to give it its own container.

Altman Plants of Vista, CA is the supplier. I think they also supply other big box stores. I saw a similar product in a different pot at Walmart, marked with the same regular price.

In greenhouse news, I picked up onion sets at Walmart, $4 for an assortment of 100 white, yellow and purple. I gave some away because I don't have room for 100 onions in the greenhouse. The alliums are already growing in the southwest planter, so I'm going to designate that my onion/garlic section. I was going to put some flowers there, but those are now designated only for the southeast planter. The east planter will be strawberries, and the west planter will be tomatoes, peppers and a few other things. The bench and open area on the north wall will be lined with plenty of other stuff in pots and grow bags, and the 50+ succulents will be... somewhere.

Spring

The Mammillaria bocasana 'Powder Puff' Cactus is starting to bloom. There are a few more buds in addition to this bloom. Nothing concrete yet from the other two little cacti.

I watered most of my plants today and noticed that the 'Rainbow' spread out a little overnight and from certain angles gives some hint at what it will look like and what the colors will be. But the plant needs to grow out of the damage it was shipped with. Unlike the 'Apricot Beauty' which lost its leaves in transit, in my opinion this one went into the box damaged, and they charged a premium price for it. I might patronise the other three companies again I've ordered from, but not this one. BTW, the 'Powder Puff' Cactus shown above is the only cactus I've gotten online, from Mountain Crest.

Postal

Every time I do an unboxing of an online plant order, I say, "Never again." Today was no exception. I received the box from The Next Gardener, three days later than the USPS estimate. The box looked fine on the outside but inside was the usual scene of chaos. I would rate three of the six plants as initial disappointments. This includes the primary reason for the order, Echeveria 'Rainbow,' the variegated variant of 'Perle von Nurnberg.'

'Rainbow' cost $22.10, and for that price I think it should be more ready for prime time. It is a large plant and I believe it was damaged before it went in the box, not beaten up by the USPS. I had to strip about 15 dead/damaged leaves off of it and potted it up as best I could. Here it is with its cousin 'Perle' that I got about a month ago.

In the background of the above image is the Crassula cv. 'Buddha's Temple' which also did not make a good initial impression. It escaped from its pot inside the box, and it has such a small, dry root system that it was top heavy and toppled over when I tried to put it back in. I'm not going to water the others for a few days, but I will water this one today to try to get it anchored.

Here are all six plants after the unboxing. At lower left is the Pachyphytum 'Apricot Beauty,' which lost all of its leaves on one side during the transit. One good thing about having your succulents delivered by the US Postal Service is you always have lots of loose leaves that you can try to propagate.

In the front center is the Echeveria 'Linda Jean' which arrived in OK condition except for a mangled leaf or two, and next is the top-heavy Crassula that refused to sit in its pot. In the back row, the Echeveria Purpusorums flank the 'Rainbow.' Right out of the box, the Purpusorums were in the best condition of the bunch. I ordered two of them because I have fat fingers and didn't notice until later. I potted up one of them and stuck the other one into the Bonsai Bowl with the three unknowns.

After four experiences, I have to rate ordering succulents online as miserable. But I'm in the middle of Montana and it is the only practical way for me to get certain varieties, such as 'Rainbow.' I placed orders with four different companies, and I'll rate Ramsey's first, Mountain Crest and Plants for Pets tied for second, and The Next Gardener bringing up the rear. Ramseys is the least expensive, their quality is as good or better than the others, and there were no disasters like the 'Apricot Beauty' I got today or the 'Lovely Rose' I got from Mountain Crest five weeks ago. 'Lovely Rose' is still hanging in there, thanks for asking.

Except for situations like charging a premium price for a lopsided 'Rainbow,' it's usually not the companies' fault that it is not a good experience. Shipping plants is a difficult thing to do, and having the US Postal Service as your carrier only complicates the process. (Plants for Pets used UPS.) I have one more plant order that I am expecting. In April, Burpees is sending me strawberries. I'm not worried about the 25 bare roots, but I'm also getting one live plant.

Update April 17: If nothing else, The Next Gardener has responsive customer service. I received a replacement for 'Apricot Beauty' and a replacement is on its way for 'Rainbow.' So that's good. But I'm still nagged by the suspicion that the plants were not in good condition going into the box, particularly 'Rainbow.' I probably will not order from them again, but they do answer their emails.

I would like to patronize local stores, but (as I said) some varieties are only available online. Maybe I'll find Gollum at Home Depot, but most of these on my wish list probably are not there:

• Echeveria Elegans 'Mexican Snowball'
• Echeveria 'Doris Taylor'
• Echeveria pulvinata 'Frosty'
• Echeveria runyonii 'Topsy Turvy'
• Gollum Jade
• Graptovia Fred Ives
• Greenovia aurea variegata
• Kalanchoe humilis 'Desert Surprise'
• Lapidaria margaretae Karoo Rose
• Sempervivum Virgil Ford

Also today, I potted up (6") two of the Monarda (Bee Balm) that I raised from seed. One more is still in a 4" pot. In addition to being a woody shrub it has herbal uses, and I want to put one of them in a barrel outside the greenhouse along with other herbs. The other one or two Monarda I might plant in my yard. Supposedly they are hardy.

The pepper plants are ready to pot up from seed starters to 4", that is assuming they recover from the infestation of aphids that I tried to smother with soap today. Others that might be ready to get 4" pots are the latest thyme attempt and some green onion sprouts. As I move up to larger pots, space inside the garage becomes more difficult to find. The monarda above took the place of two rosemary plants. They are under grow lights with a sliver of sunlight from the south window. The two rosemary along with two mint plants "volunteered" to move to the greenhouse to test their hardiness. I'm not planning on turning on the heat for two more weeks. The temperature isn't supposed to get much below freezing the next week or so, and I piled straw around them. If they don't survive, I've got plenty more where they came from.

Another tunia haircut

Most of my Aloe Vera looks abused due to overwatering, bad light and/or bugs, but I have one perfect little plant that has been sitting on an upper shelf in a garage window that has escaped all of that. It isn't growing very fast now, but I'm expecting great things once it moves to the greenhouse in a little over a month. Next to it on that upper shelf is Petunia #2, the cutting I took Nov. 15. It was becoming a monster and threatening to swallow the aloe. I knew something had to be done. If it was May and it was in the greenhouse now, I would give it a haircut, repot it, and hit it with fertilizer. But in the limited space of the garage, I don't want it taking up more space than it already is, so a haircut is all I was able to do. Here are before and after images of #2 next to the perfect little aloe.

Petunias are not annuals, they are "tender perrenials," which means they will survive in a heated garage over the winter and be ready to go outside again come warmer weather. I have the big Pentunia #1 pot that I kept from last summer, Petunia #2, and three or four plastic cups that contain cuttings from #1's haircut at the end of January. (BTW, #1 has grown about five inches since the trim six weeks ago.) I don't really want that many of this type of petunia, whatever it is. Some sort of purple-veined hybrid from Home Depot is my best guess. All of this is just practice. Propagating from petunia cuttings is something I want to be good at next fall when the Supertunias are about to get frozen.

I cancelled my Garden Crossings order because of uncertainty when the order would arrive vs. our travel schedule in May, but I want to get at least four Supertunias locally for baskets. With all of the succulents I've bought recently, garage space is at a premium and I will have to make some tough choices when the greenhouse heat goes off next November. I counted today and I've got 10 peppermint plants. I do not need 10 peppermint plants. I need about four so I can have something in greenhouse window boxes that the deer won't eat. And if they do eat it, I won't care. Some of the peppermint may get moved to a dark corner after Monday, which appears to be the date for the next succulent shipment unboxing. I should have known not to believe that crap from the USPS about delivery today, but I'm just a starry-eyed optimist. Of course after months of a mild winter, we are having a blizzard today and the heat pack I bought with the order is probably almost drained.

I anticipate the flower baskets with the Supers will be outside from June 1 to August 31, then they will take refuge in the greenhouse when frost threatens and survive in some form until mid-November. With that assumption, this is the plan:

• Don't wait until November, start taking tunia cuttings in September.
• Use rooting hormone.
• Take more than one cutting from each variety. If some of them don't prosper by mid-October, there will be time take more cuttings.
• The cuttings don't have to become monsters like #1 and #2, they just have to survive the winter in relatively small pots.

Macro

Fun with a macro lens. Some of these are new, some have been around for six weeks. Let's start with 'Lola.'

It looked like 'Lola' was sending up a flower stalk around Feb. 4.
Then it noticed, "I'm not in a warm place" and abandoned the effort.

'Perle von Nurnberg' is a bit more purple than 'Red Sky' (next image).

'Red Sky'

'Neon Breakers' color reminds me of the previous two, but it also has the ruffles.

'Raindrops' had a rough transit but is looking better a month later.

The Trader Joe's no-name Echeveria is a perfect little rosette.

My first Aeonium, 'Floresens.' Those aren't my water spots; I'm careful.

The Setosa will get even hairier and develop some color.

It all started when I wanted to get a jade.

Survivor

Every since a dried-up little ball rolled out of the Plants for Pets box on Jan. 29, I haven't known whether it was alive. Today there is proof that it is.

The parents or siblings to this little ball, three rosettes of Sempervivum arachnoideum, were damaged in the frost of Feb. 19.

The little ball measures about 7/8ths of an inch. I considered whether to try cleaning the debris off it, but don't think it can be done without damaging the webbing. Here is a picture of it Feb. 16. The webbing was thicker then and it was hard to tell if there was actual green underneath, but today there is no doubt.

Something new

I have 17 varieties of Echeveria because they are such nice little plants, but sometimes I need something new. I took an unexpected drive to Cody today to accomplish a task that took two seconds once I was on site, so to make the trip worthwhile I went by Walmart to see what they had. They had a really big Echeveria of a type I hadn't heard of, but I also saw this little 'Bear's Paw,' Cotyledon ladismithiensis. After checking the interweb, it seems to be the most famous of the small genus Cotyledon. This one seemed really dry and almost limp, so I violated the Inviolable Rules of Succulents and watered it right after I potted it. Here's a quick phone photo just before it got water.

My spouse brought eight 4-inch terra cotta pots to the marriage, and I wondered what I was going to do with them. They seemed too small for anything. That was before I discovered succulents. I believe I now have 14 such pots, including one I purchased today for the Bear's Paw because I didn't have anything available. I have the gray one I just 3D printed, but it has been too windy to seal it with the clear enamel I use.

I won't even mention how many 6-inch terra cotta pots I have bought in the past nine months. It's a bigger number than the 4s. The plants have been a considerable expense in recent months, but the pots and the dirt add up also.

Bowls

I have two large bowls I'm using for random plants that need a place to live. In the 8-inch Bonsai, I've got just three things so far, the unidentified Echeveria, the unidentified Grapto-something (both extras from the Ramsey order), and an unidentified cutting that I got from my nephew. I ordered two Echeveria Purpusorums by mistake a few days ago, and the extra will end up in this bowl.

I have a little bit more of a plan with the 10-inch Montage. Starting at the back left and going somewhat clockwise:

• Oscularia deltoides 'Ice Plant' - This is a spreader, and it is big enough now to take about half of it and put it elsewhere.
• Haworthia limifolia 'Fairy Washboard' - Recently-planted pup, the only Haworthia to escape my office so far.
• 'Velveteen Aromatic' ™ - I stuck this in there just to fill in some space. If it gets too big it can go elsewhere.
• Senecio haworthii 'Cocoon Plant' - Another plant where I could take half of it and put it elsewhere.
• Sedum adolphi 'Shooting Stars' - Another spreader, I could re-allocate two-thirds of this.
• Echeveria 'Lilac Mist' (center) - I got four rosettes of this, and put one of them in here.
• Crassula perforata variegata
• Rosemary, another filler that doesn't have to be here.

The two bowls may spend some time in the greenhouse, but I envision they will spend most of the summer on our patios. Many succulents want good light but not direct noonday sun. The front patio gets morning sun, and the back gets evening light. The locations are under cover so won't get rained on (much), and I can bring them inside if a windy downpour is expected.

I've been pondering whether to summer the succulents, about 50, in the greenhouse. The 50 I'm not sure about excludes the house plants (Haworthias, Crassulas, cacti) which definitely will not move, and the multiple pots of 'Velveteen Aromatic' ™ and Aloe which will be in the greenhouse for sure. It includes most of the Echeverias, Graptos, Pachyphytums, Sedums/hybrids, and the surviving Sempervivums (moment of silence, please).

The raised beds in the greenhouse are getting strawberries, tomatoes, peppers and flowers, and there will be strawberry baskets and various large pots/grow bags. I'm planning on setting up irrigation, so it likely is to get a bit humid in there, which a lot of succulents don't like. But if I keep them in the garage, they may get overheated. Here in the Montana foothills the humidity is usually quite low, and even when the greenhouse gets steamed up during a watering, it usually comes down quickly. And I'll try to set the sprinklers so they don't shoot water into the air. So I answered my own question, the 50 will be moving over there for the summer.

More pictures

I've posted a few images of the recent Ramsey order but still had 13 to do. I shot 11 of them today using focus bracketing, shooting 24 images of each at various focus points. I stacked as few as eight images and as many as all 24 to get the final results. I still have to take a shot of the Bonsai Bowl which contains the two unidentified extras. I also included a couple shots from the greenhouse of the four healthy Sempervivums and the "Spring has sprung" alliums.

I'm now aware of a significant limitation of focus bracketing in macro photography. With a mostly-flat surface like a coin being shot at an angle, it works great. With a subject like a plant which has leaves in front of other leaves, the process can not bring a back leaf into focus where it is close (line of sight) to a front leaf. When the back leaf is in focus, the front leaf is blurry and that blur covers part of the back leaf. You can see it in most of these images, for example the leaves at about 2:00 in the first image. I think the AI in Photoshop helps a little bit but sometimes makes things worse, as it did with the Sedum Jelly Bean stack. I had to clean that up a little bit.

With these plants, the problem can be minimized by shooting from a higher angle, which I should do anyway with something like the Cubic Frost to better show off its structure. I also could shoot with a smaller aperture, but as is usual in photography there are tradeoffs, namely longer shutter speeds and less blurring of the far background which you do not want to be in focus. For all of these images, I stopped down from the lens maximum aperture of f/2.8 to f/4.0, but that had minimal effect.

In no particular order, the recent additions include:

Echeveria Setosa Var. 'Deminuta,' a fuzzy Echeveria.

Echeveria 'Blue Curls,' there is some leaf damage on this from hitting the edge
of the pot it was in, it looks more red than blue. We will see how it develops.

Echeveria 'Lilac Mist,' came with four rosettes, I pulled one off and
put it in the Montage bowl. I seems a bit more green than when I got it.

Echeveria Compressicaulis, a more upright Echeveria.

Echeveria 'Chroma,' it shifts colors with the seasons, I have high hopes for this one.

Echeveria 'Cubic Frost,' weird leaves, an overhead shot would do it more
justice. There are three distinct rosettes and I may divide it at some point.

March 13: Here's that overhead shot of Echeveria 'Cubic Frost.'

Sempervivum 'Strawberry Kiwi,' my first Chick Charms.

Graptosedum 'Alpenglow,' colorful, can trail.

Sedum 'Jelly Bean' in a 3D-printed pot.

Aeonium 'Floresens,' my first Aeonium.

Sedum Firestorm.

I did stop at the greenhouse today. It's only three weeks until things really start happening there. The four Sempervivums who survived the Semperpocalypse still seem fine. The allium has some limp leaves, but all the interweb advice is that these do not need much moisture. My moisture meter says the surface is dry but there is moisture down deep. I resisted the temptation and did not water either the Semps or the allium.