Kalanchoe silhouette

 Here is a line-up of "classic" Kalanchoe shapes. 

Mother of Thousands----Mother of Millions----Pink Butterflies

All of these are young plants, less than a year old. The tiles are 25 cm in length.  See the individual posts for details. 

Kalanchoe Mother of Thousands, Mother of Millions and Pink Butterflies

I started collecting the Kalanchoes because I'd had a Mother of Thousands as a kid.  Once I started looking for them as an adult, I realized that commercial nurseries don't always know which Kalanchoe species they are selling.  There is apparently a lot of confusion over which of the stalky, leggy, classical Kalanchoes are which. 

Mother of Thousands is often said to be K. diagremontiana and you'll see it pictured as having broad, pale green leaves, for example here.  As far as I know, that appearance is more typical of K. laetivirens, which means "green all over."  Laetivirens is a hybrid of K. diagremontiana and K. laxiflora. 

I have another plant said to be K. diagremontiana which is most likely a different hybrid, Kalanchoe x houghtonii, which I wrote about earlier. 

Pictured below, my most-probably x laetivirens.

As you can see, the Mother of Thousands lives up to its name. It has literally dozens of plantlets growing along every mature leaf margin. These either fall off and root or, in my case, come off when I touch them to feel the irresistible detaching motion as they separate. (I've likened it to shelling peas in terms of tactile satisfaction.) The mother plant makes so many of these that they can become a nuisance or even invasive.  Best to keep them in pots and remove leaf debris before they root.

Mothers of Thousands look lovely at this age, but after a year or so, they become large and leggy. They don't regrow well if you cut them (at least mine didn't) but you can uproot them or cut them off at soil level, and believe me they'll have sufficient babies underneath to fill the area. It's not like you have to buy any new ones!

Mother of Millions is another species.  Mine was sold as K. tubiflora but it can also be seen on sale as K. delagoensis.  It's also often known as a Chandelier Plant. It's a classic Kalanchoe shape, a thick weedy stalk with beautiful leaves. In this case, the leaves are almost cylindrical with a furrow along the top, and a spray of plantlets at the very tip of the mature leaves. I think in a cage match between Mother of Thousands and Mother of Millions, Thousands would win in the number-of-plantlets competition. However, it's MoM that is designated as an invasive species - the plantlets escape and are hard to eradicate from your landscape. 

K. tubiflora is another one which will get tall and leggy. It's too small for six months, just right for three months and then a weed for the rest of its lifecycle. 

However, there's no doubt it's beautiful when seen from above. (Which is why it's pictured that way in for sale ads.)

One of my favorite Kalanchoes is Pink Butterflies. When I first started collecting these plants it seemed so rare and exotic. I eventually found one from a Chinese seller and weeks later obtained one through the post, thoroughly chemically treated before it had been allowed in the country. In its many days on a boat and trapped in customs, it had wilted to a sad stalk with a few collapsed leaves at the top and a dozen dried curls where the older leaves had been. 

But as I've said before, Kalanchoes are just sproinging with growth tissues. I put it in water for a few days then planted it and got a perfectly good Pink Butterflies out of it. Because it had lost lower leaves it was a bit stalky, so when I found a domestic seller, I bought three more. They rooted perfectly as well. In a few months the "Pink Butterflies" appeared - rows of pink plantlets along the margins of the leaves, lending the plant an eye-catching fringe. 

Unlike with Mother of Millions and Mother of Thousands, the plantlets don't have chlorophyll (or they'd be green). They fall off in the same quantities, but very few of them root and generate enough chlorophyll to start growing. My original four turned  into about eight or nine, all of which are slower growing than their parents. I'm fine with that. As I have said, the "classic" Kalanchoe look can turn into a tall, bolted weed surmounted with unimpressive flowers, so the little ones are fine by me. 

Pink Butterflies are also hybrids - Kalanchoe delagoensis x daigremontiana, our old friends.

Resources for growing these can be found on the web. I accessed Wikipedia (delagoensis), California Cactus Center (Pink Butterflies - this is a video), Gardening Know-How ,(delagoensis), Wikipedia (laetivirens).

Kalanchoe tomentosa "Panda Plant" and "Chocolate Soldier"

 K. tomentosa, the Panda Plant, is a pretty, furry, compact succulent that can be grown indoors or outside if you live in a warm area. (I'm in Southern California.)

The edges of the leaves have contrasting dark brown spots, making for a striking display plant. Mine have grown considerably but aren't bolting or putting down many plantlets. 

K. tomentosa also comes in a variety called "Chocolate Soldier". You can see one to the right of the Panda Plant below.  It's a bit lost in a pot outside but would make a lovely houseplant if you can get it enough light. Care for them is the same - they just have more of the dark coloring. 

You can find tips on K. tomentosa on the web. I looked at Gardening Know-How and World of Succulents.

Millot's Kalanchoe

 Kalanchoe millottii is a pale green, furry succulent that stays quite small.  It's the one nearest the camera in the photo below.  It has pleasing scalloped leaf edges and thick succulent leaves. So far it is making a good effort to form a little clump of plants. It's less than 25 cm tall. It hasn't flowered (in a year) and is showing no signs of bolting yet. 

On the other hand, the new leaves (to the upper left) are not the same shape. They resemble K. tomentosa. No idea if every specimen does this or if it's just mine. 

(Update: it's probably a hybrid between the two - see here for details. Thanks, correspondent Kyle.)

Important care tips for millotii can be found at World of Succulents. To which I'd add: don't get water on the felted leaves when it's sunny. You can see the leaf damage that results on the far leftmost leaf. 

(The other plants visible in the pot are K. beharensis Blue Slick and K. Marnieriana, about which more elsewhere.)

Kalanchoe collection: Fedtschenkoi "Lavender Scallops" and compacta

 There's a regularly-seen Kalanchoe called Lavender Scallops. Its pink-and-pale-green foliage makes for a pretty display in succulent gardens or in pots. It grows about 30 cm high and forms comely clumps. It pales (no pun intended) in comparison with its compact form. This tiny plant has the same leaves, but they remain upturned forming a scalloped cylinder. 

K. fedtschenkoi is on the left in this picture, with a rooted plantlet in the forefront center. I used to have a whole potful of them, but they grew a bit leggy over the course of a year so I started afresh. (Getting a bit leggy is a Kalanchoe trait.)

The "compacta" variety stays small. It doesn't bolt...that's what the compacta part means. This one is over a year old and is growing new stalks regularly, but remains about 10 cm high. I was startled when I got it in the mail, as it was so small. But that's how big it is. If you buy one, don't be fooled by the photos that show them as miniature towers. (If that ever happens, I'll let you know!)

(The other two plants in the top picture are K. longiflora and K. "Pink Butterflies". More on them elsewhere.)

Resources on K. fedtschenkoi can be found at Succulents and Sunshine and The Hosta Farm. 

Kalanchoe collection - the spoons. Copper, Silver and Grey Ghost.

 If you're in the right zones to grow Kalanchoes outside, a midsize beauty is Copper Spoons, Kalanchoe orgyalis. It's another furry plant, so it's sometimes known as Cinnamon Bear and rather less glamorously, the Shoe Leather Plant. 

It grows to about a meter, three feet, high and doesn't lose the lower leaves. (Well, it didn't until I let it get sunburned during a heatwave.) It's a striking plant that requires little care and unlike some Kalanchoes, doesn't go leggy and horrible at the end of the year. 

Copper Spoons

I bought a small one to fill in the gaps at the bottom of the larger Copper Spoons where I let it get burned in the hot sun. I think if you treat it well, the leaves normally last for years. 

This is such a lovely and long lasting plant that when I saw a variety of it called Grey Ghost, I immediately took it home with me. 

Grey Ghost looked ghostly and great for a few months and then turned into another Copper Spoons. I don't know if that always happens. There's no information on it I can find on the internet, but the nursery label was professionally done, not a handwritten guess. The plant is still a beauty. 

Grey Ghost

You can see that the lower leaves are still grey, but the top is distinctly cinnamon. This is a plant that has not read its own label.

Not closely related is the much more delicate Silver Spoons, Kalanchoe bracteata or Kalanchoe hildebrantii. 

Silver Spoons is the taller, more delicate plant to the right. It's a slow grower - this one is a year old. It's also the only Kalanchoe I've had that's been attacked by aphids. I have a 2" pot in the greenhouse with a young one but it's not exactly growing like Topsy.  One of its names, bracteata, either means 'bronzed' (nope) or 'bearing flowers on specialized leaves.' It's the second one - the bracts are the sites of new growth in this plant. All Kalanchoe seem to have a body part that's raring to grow new plants. 

Information on these plants can be found here:  Etsy Store, Succulents and Sunshine, 

Kalanchoe gastonis-bonnieri, "Donkey Ears"

One of the most spectacular Kalanchoes is K. gastonis-bonnieri. (Its name is as impressive as the plant.) Like a Mother of Thousands, it bears plantlets on its leaves. Not a whole row, like the mother, but one or two at the very tip. And the leaf itself is often over 25 cm long. They really do look like Donkey Ears, if donkeys had thick, green, hairless ears. 

My current ones are still babies, with small, rounded seedling leaves. Here's a picture of their mother, late last year, during flowering. 

Kalanchoe gastonis-bonnieri, Donkey Ears

Eight month old Donkey Ears

It took quite a bit of care to get the plantlets from the leaf tips to root in soil and start growing. It's worth it to have such a display plant at the end of the year. (You can buy them online but usually you'll get one of the small ones, so it will still take most of a year to get a grown specimen.)

I found further information on Donkey Ears at Plant Care Today.

Kalanchoe collection: humilis and marmorata

 I saw a Kalanchoe marmorata on sale and it sounded like a good idea at the time. It means "marbled" and the name gives the impression of a stately, expensive-looking plant. It turned out to be a bedding plant that I haven't found a way to display properly yet, so forgive the boring-looking presentation. 

Those tiles are a foot across, so you can see this a a large-leaved plant that would look good in a border. It's shown no sign of bolting or flowering yet, but Kalanchoes do tend to suddenly shoot upwards and ruin an arrangement. I'll let you know if it does. The marbling is a little dull, but again probably interesting en masse.  It's known as the Penwiper plant, or Penwipe. I have no idea why. 

Don't get water on the leaves! They're smooth but they'll still scar up if water dries on them. 

Scarred leaf of marmorata

Another plant was sold to me as a marmorata, but it never grew bigger than its 4" pot. Eventually it put out a spray of beautiful flowers that lasted for months. Of course, I didn't take a photo of the flowers and eventually I cut the plant back to bring out the plantlets. 

I'm sure it's a Kalanchoe humilis. Same marbled leaves, but about 15 cm shorter. 

I'm sorry I butchered you, little humilis. In a year or so I'll be able to separate the plantlets and hopefully get more sprays of lovely flowers. 

I got more information on humilis from Succulents and Sunshine, though they do call it a "large shrub".  I don't call a foot-tall plant a shrub, myself.  More information on marmorata can be found at World of Succulents. 

Shared the garden with insects today

 Spent the day in the yard. So did the insects. 

A Plague of Locust on the beans. These huge grasshoppers are a nuisance around here, mostly because they're too large for my Jackson's chameleons to eat. I need to get another giant Veiled male. They loved them. 

A butterfly which I am reliably told is a Black Swallowtail, Papilio polyxenes. It's on the beans too, but apparently it's after the carrots. It looked completely fresh and new, but I haven't seen any caterpillars on the carrots so far. 

More Kalanchoe beharensis - Blue Slick, Fang, Flag and Oak Leaf

 I wrote about my largest plants, K. beharensis here, the furry Felt Plant, some varieties of which grow to tree size. 

K beharensis Blue Slick rootstock regrown, with plantlets grown
from planted leaf

There are many varieties of beharensis on offer, including one which isn't furry at all, the strangely naked-mole-rat-feeling K beharensis "Blue Slick."  I think it may be K. beharensis var. subnuda. 

I bought one Blue Slick a couple of years ago, and when it lost its lower leaves I panicked. (I know now they usually lose the lower leaves.) I cut it up and planted the remaining leaves and the top separately and left the root+stalk in the pot.  Every last part of that plant regrew. It's Kalanchoe's superpower! 

The roots regenerated two good-looking branches bearing hairless leaves. Each leaf I planted grew a thicket of babies and the top rooted and grew a new plant. 

K beharensis Blue Slick plantlets - they have fur

The oddest thing is the leaves (which were, well, slick, not furry) grew furry babies. The new plants are almost a year old and have not lost their fur. It's possible that comes later but it's very odd. (Kalanchoe plants that reproduce by offshoots like this are clones. Their genetic material is identical to the parent plant. They don't just change varieties or hybridize like plants sometimes do when they produce seeds with other plants' pollen.)

Now I know that Blue Slick is going to grow huge like its cousin, I'll let it lose lower leaves and continue to grow. 

One thing to remember about the deeply-indented leaves, especially furry ones: don't leave drops of water on top of them while they're in the sun. It burns the leaves and the scar never heals over. 

I have another variety of K. beharensis called Fang. What appears to be the same thing was also sold to me under the variety name Flag. Both of these have the normal cupped, furry beharensis leaves but with canine-tooth-shaped protuberances on the underside. Since they carry their leaves tipped-up most of the time, it's possible to appreciate their striking looks even when they are quite small. 

Kalanchoe beharensis "Fang" (or "Flag"). 
The smaller plants are baby Mother of Thousands that fell off Mother.

Kalanchoe beharensis "Fang" in pot

The last variety I have of this species is one I think is marketed as "Oak Leaf". The one I bought just said it was a beharensis, but it grew into this beautiful specimen. I'm guessing that it's an Oak Leaf since the leaves look that way. It's growing quite large but I don't know if it'll reach the tree-level heights that some K beharensis varieties can. If I've identified it correctly, it's a hybrid, Kalanchoe beharensis with K. millotii. (There are similar varieties, for example those sold as "Silver Strand" (which never give information on variety or hybrid status). This certainly isn't yet "densely branched" so I may change my mind when I see what the flowers look like, if any.)

Kalanchoe beharensis "Oak Leaf " (probably). 
(K tomentosa behind and to the left, K hildebrantia behind.)

Webpages with resources for these plants include Gardenia.net, Plant Material and San Martino.  

Kalanchoe collection: Pies from Heaven

 Kalanchoes may have twelve-foot tall tree varieties, but they also have a selection of midsize and even small species. 

The smallest I have rejoices in the name Pies from Heaven. Unfortunately, it doesn't bear real pies on its branches, and even if it did, they'd be 1cm pie slices. A bit small. 

These are Kalanchoe rhombopilosa, evolved to live in the dry, rocky soil of Madagascar slopes. 

It's a beautiful plant but it's so small I haven't figured out a way to show it off yet - you'd have to give visitors a magnifying glass to appreciate its little heavenly pies. (It also hasn't grown a centimeter in the four months I've had it.) I guess this is rhombo's little moment of glory. Say hello to the internet, rhombo!

I resource I used for K. rhombopilosa was Kalanchoe Succulent. They have a picture of a fully grown specimen on that page for comparison. 

Kalanchoe beharensis

 One of the more spectacular Kalanchoes is beharensis, which grows to tree height in its native lands and, of course, in Disneyland. 

Disneyland Kalanchoe beharensis

I only just started growing my own, and it's not quite that large yet. 

Here's one of my K beharensis, being moved into its barrel. 

These are sometimes called Felt Plants, because the leaves are furry. They're slow growing, so if you get a 6" pot from the nursery, it will get impressive in the second year but won't become imposing for several more years. The one above was purchased in a ten-gallon container. Half-price! I think the Gnome Despot people assumed that because it had lost lower leaves, it was dying. Nope, the taller varieties usually lose the lower leaves. 

You can see in all three pictures that the professional growers take the top off the plant after a couple of years. (You can root and replant the top - Kalanchoe's main claim to fame is it is just busting out with meristematic tissue.) Taking the top off makes the root+stalk branch out when it regrows, so if you're lucky, you get a well-balanced three-branch plant. Of course, if you do it at home you have a headless plant for six months until it regrows the new tops. In my experience, any Kalanchoe that can be topped and regenerated like that looks far better than a single-stalk plant. In many cases, a single Kalanchoe plant can become a giant, weedy pole that is just not pretty.  A branched one looks much better. 

A resource I used for K. beharensis was Plant Care Today.

I've also collected a couple of different types of this lovely Madagascar plant, which I'll discuss on the blog elsewhere. 

Kalanchoe Collection: the Khaleesi Plant, Mother of Thousands

Over lockdown, I've been building up a collection of Kalanchoe plants. 

I had one as a child. A 'Mother of Thousands,' it resembled the ones currently available but I remember the leaves being slightly different. The most notable thing about a Mother of Thousands is the row of tiny baby plants all along the edges of the mature leaves. I loved looking at them, the babies perfectly-formed miniatures of the mother, like Mandelbrot plants, and most of all I liked taking the newly-rooted babies off the leaves. They have a perfect amount of attachment, so it takes exactly the right amount of slight force to dislodge them, and they snap off with a just-audible tweaking sound that is 100% the correct level of tweaking sound. I'm unsure how to describe how made-for-humans this plantlet attachment seems to be. The nearest sensory activity would be popping the shell of what Americans call "English Peas" and pulling out the peas with a thumbnail. 

Lucky for me I had a large plant, so new leaves were ready to depopulate soon after. 

Having tried, during lockdown, Mexican Jumping Beans (fun soon wore off, both for me and them) and Grow Live Sea Monkeys (they were much as I remembered them), a Drosera (carnivorous plant) and a Venus Flytrap (dits), I found that Amazon also carried live Mothers of Thousands. 

Once I had one, I developed a habit and went on the explore the whole Kalanchoe oeuvre, which I'll discuss here over the next few posts. Kalanchoe are succulents, and grow in cactus medium or potting soil with a little sand or pumice to keep it draining well. They are African and Madagascar plants, which as you can imagine, like sunlight and relatively dry soil.  I won't go into details as I show mine, but I'll give links to resources. 

The one pictured below was sold to me as a Kalanchoe diagremontiana, Mother of Thousands. It's quite likely it's a Kalanchoe x houghtonii, a hybrid that includes diagremontiana. I guess unless you intend to sell seeds, it doesn't really matter. 

It arrived bare-root in the winter and has been growing outside in Southern California ever since.  Growth was slow but steady, and in the past few weeks it's started producing the plantlets along the leaf margins. If I leave them alone, they'll root when the leaf dies and drops off. If I push them off, the more mature ones will root as soon as they land. One of these plants is often surrounded by a little plantation of babies, and every time you repot a plant, you end up with a few transferred across to every pot you used that day. (One Kalanchoe is regarded as an invasive in some countries because of this habit.) It seems mean to compost them but you can't grow them all. 

It's one of two types of Kalanchoe with that common name and you also see it advertised as an Alligator Plant, from its sharp, toothy-looking leaves, and Devil's Backbone, which I think is just plain mean, poor thing. More recently, it's been sold as a Khaleesi Plant. Catchy name!

There's lots of info on the web, and one resource I used is Gardening Know How, here. 

Panhe 2022

Panhe celebration will be held March 27, 2022.

A Native American gathering and celebration of protection and preservation. 

San Mateo Campground, San Onofre State Beach, San Clemente. 

Admission is free.

 

Gas Station Sushi (fiction)

Recently, I saw a writing challenge for "The Last Gas Station", for which one was asked to write a piece about the concept, rather than the reality. The concept of the last gas station, apparently, was the last chance to do something, or avert something, before a bad thing happens. Possibly the challenger had gotten it mixed up with The Last Chance Saloon, a similar concept with which I'm more familiar. 

I remembered a gas station I had once visited. In the middle of nowhere, it had blossomed out of the heat haze of the desert like a combination mirage and oasis, a vast edifice of neon light, cool breeze, flowing liquids and ice cubes.  I wrote about it, thought about the challenge a bit more and realized I loved the gas station part more than the "last" part.  Here it is. 

Gas station sushi

Three hundred miles of sagebrush emptied the tank of the Chevy Impala. The roadside billboards advertising the Arizona Travel Center had been appearing more frequently and the tall sign indicating the building itself materialized just as the tank indicator began to flash its red “E”. 

“Travel Center? It’s a gas station,” I said as we pulled away from the pump replete with regular unleaded and parked in the shade of a pylon bearing gas prices, the temperature (104 degrees) and the promise of a Grab’n’Go Hot Dog Bar.

“Wait till you get inside,” he said.

The glass doors swished open like the Starship Enterprise revealing the front line of displays. Slim Jims, Matador Jerky, All-American Jack Link’s Beef & Cheese. After navigating past these, and the racks of Pringles, Poppycock, popcorn and chips, and the wasabi peas and gummi bears, nuts and trail mix, wrapped bread and gum (Extra Icebreakers, Juicy Drop), we approached the long wall of refrigerators. Six glass doors held back neon-colored soft drinks, two the Beer Cave, one the Dairy Chilled Foods, one the wine (Refridgeriffic) and one (The Cool Zone) containing sushi. Little California Rolls in plastic trays, with plastic rows of grass separating the ginger from the wasabi, the chopsticks from the sachet of soy sauce, and each of them from the sushi. Eleven bucks.

He laughed. “Gas station sushi. Where I come from, it’s a phrase meaning take a chance on something dangerous, I guess. Or just a word for a good-looking bad idea.”

On the other wall, mirroring the refrigerators, the Hot Snacks. Under heat lights hot dogs rolled. In warm cabinets pies and grilled subs estivated in factory-sealed plastic bags. Nachos waited in cardboard trays for a squirt of liquid cheese. Next to the hot dog roller was a bank of the freshest-looking food I’d seen in days, beef franks, sweet pepper provolone sausages, bratwurst, Fenway Franks and Vegetarian Dogs. I was hungry. I chose a regular frankfurter, and from the hot dog buns, brioche buns, Hawaiian buns and Salty Pretzel Buns I chose pretzel. Sixteen fixins for hot dogs dwelt in black plastic wells behind a protective sneeze guard.  They were chili, jalapeno, sauerkraut, tomato slices, lettuce, diced onion, sweet relish, cheese, pickle spears, onion sour cream, kimchi, gochujang, Habanero Nuclear Blast, Kentucky Slaw and other, more orange, cheese, and bacon bits. I put sweet relish and diced onion on mine. There were dispensers you pressed down on to create wavy lines of sauce on your dog, and they were ketchup, yellow mustard, brown sauce, horseradish, mayo, salsa, buffalo wing sauce and Sriracha. I mashed down on mustard and mayo.

He chose sushi, a bright, cool tray of avocado-topped California Roll, dyed salmon-color Sake Sushi, deep red Tekka Maki and cool green Kappa Maki. We were five hundred miles from the nearest ocean.

*

I guess I am more comfortable now with American food. In my previous Christmas food story, Hotel Aperio, I concentrated on British food, which is way funnier (though the story itself isn't).