Welcome to what, after almost three minutes of deliberation, I have decided to call:
"Growing Succulents. How Hard Can It Be?"
First things first. I am not a gardener.
I do occasionally 'do' gardening but this is, by and large, limited to mowing the lawn, moving bags of compost, or donning body armour to go up a ladder and chop off 'some of that bl&*dy pyracantha'.
If you are reading this blog in order to get advice from an expert, I urge you to look elsewhere. What I know about gardening generally, and succulents specifically, could be written on the back of a postage stamp, and you wouldn't need to use a particularly small font.
This blog will document my attempts to learn something about the subject, largely through trial and error. So I'd suggest that you're more likely to learn from my mistakes than my experience.
But as the title says... How hard can it be? Right?
Right?
When it comes to gardening, my wife is the one with the green fingers, and while I've always appreciated how lovely she makes our garden look, I've never felt the urge to get involved. (1)
Until now.
Having trailed around garden centres and RHS / National Trust / English Heritage gardens for many years, my eye has become expertly honed. I can now, at a glance, identify 'big plants', 'small plants', 'green plants' and 'colourful plants'. (2) And Hostas. I do know what a Hosta looks like. (3) But the ones that always catch my attention are succulents. And maybe alpines. I'm a bit fuzzy on where the line is drawn between succulents and alpines. And let's not bring cacti into it just yet.
But definitely succulents.
I think it's the fact that quite often they don't actually look like plants at all that appeals. More like some sort of alien spore or growth that's found a crevice and thought "I'll just hang out here for a while before taking over the planet."
This interest first manifested itself seriously about six months ago when we visited somewhere or other and I came back with an RHS book entitled 'The Little Book of Cacti & Succulents'. It seemed written for novices, had plenty of pictures and made the whole thing seem eminently do-able.
Trouble was, whenever we visited our local garden centres (which happens with alarming regularity), the range of succulents on offer varied from 'very small' to 'non-existent'. Where there were plants available, they just seemed to be labelled as 'generic succulent', which I found frustrating, as if I'm going to do something, I tend to want to know all there is to know, so varietal names are a must.
The one place that did have a modest range only had plants that were... substantial, and as I felt like making up an assortment, I would have needed a dustbin lid rather than a pot.
But for our recent wedding anniversary, my better half said "We haven't been to Wisley for a while, let's have a day out."
And they have a plant shop.
A well stocked plant shop.
Reader, I shopped.
I was going to by a smallish, plain pot for about £4.00, but my wife pointed out a much nicer one, by Whichford Pottery which was 'a better shape', and 'frost-proof'. It was also five times the price!
I came home with a small selection of plants, which my notes tell me are...
Sempervivum : 'big sam Pink Pomelo'
Sedum: 'Silver Roses'
Delosperma: 'congestum'
Echevaria: 'Cubic Frost'
Arenaria: 'Balearica'
Now I would like to be able to tell you that these were carefully selected to work well together, that they would tolerate the conditions that we have in our garden, and that they would be simple for a novice to care for.
Can I tell you that?
No.
I liked the look of them.
In my defence, my book had suggested some plants that were good for beginners, and I think that there was some overlap with that list and what I bought. But when I got home, I looked at the five plants, sitting loosely in the large pot, waiting to be planted and thought "They're going to look lost in there. I should buy some more!"
To the internet!
I didn't take long to find Corseside Nursery's website, and after some browsing, the following found their way into my basket.
Aloe: 'Brevifolia'
Pachyphytum: 'Little Jewel'
And a group of five small 'Fairy Garden' plants...
Crassula: 'Minima'
Aeonium: 'Cornish Pixie'
Aeonium: 'Barbatum'
Crassula: 'Sarcocaulis'
Sedum: 'Red Carpet'
These arrived this morning, carefully parcelled up and no worse the wear for a trip from the wilds of Wales.
Time to get planting!
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
(1) Unless you count the phase I had, about 15 years ago, where I took a spider plant into the office and ended up giving baby plants to most of my colleagues. However, I'd say that 'Growing a spider plant' is to gardening, what 'Putting a shop-bought ciabatta into the oven' is to baking.
(2) Gardeners World. If Monty decides to retire, you can contact me via the blog.
(3) They look like a small Gunnera!
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