What are these alien plants?

February 9, 2008 6:29 AM

Help me identify my small collection of succulents.

Over this past year I have now accumulated six different succulent plants. I have no idea what species they are, or how to care for them apart from not watering more than twice a month. Searching online has mostly yielded confusion since I know absolutely nothing about plants in general, let alone cacti/succulents.

posted by puffin to home & garden (12 comments total)

Front & center looks like a "panda plant" (Kalanchoe tomentosa). Right rear looks like it could be Mamillaria sp. of some sort. Center rear is Myrtillocactus (Candelabra Cactus) probably sp. geometrizans. Left front, I'm going to say Stenocereus sp., but that's very iffy. I'm totally blanking on right front and left rear (Escheveria?).
posted by Emperor SnooKloze at 7:03 AM on February 9, 2008

The front one in the middle is furry!

And the one on the left is giving me the finger!

IANAB, but the one in the back left corner looks very much like one that I have in my apartment... the little stick says "ariocarpus retusus".
posted by rokusan at 7:05 AM on February 9, 2008

I'm pretty confident in AskMe's ability to identify all of them, but, just in case, there are plenty of books about succulents at your local public library. Alternately, you could go to the greenhouse/nursery/garden center/Home Depot/whatever and just kinda browse the shelves.

Also, I think your next succulent should be an aloe. I like aloes.
posted by box at 7:31 AM on February 9, 2008

Yes, you should get an aloe. And some lithops!

The middle one in front looks like a kalanchoe. In the wild, they get several feet tall.
posted by Ostara at 8:35 AM on February 9, 2008

The right front looks like a very happy Jade Plant, crassula ovata. At least that's very similar to what mine look like.
posted by gemmy at 9:51 AM on February 9, 2008

Yeah that's a chubbier variety of Jade plant in front right. I want to know what back left is though, it's cool. I want one!
posted by SassHat at 10:21 AM on February 9, 2008

The back left one looks just like an Echeveria peacockii.
posted by TungstenChef at 10:53 AM on February 9, 2008

A friend sells succulents and gave these answers:

Back row.
Left. Succulent. Perhaps a Graptoveria.
Middle. Cactus. Probably a species of Cereus.
Right. cactus. I think Echinocereus (Golden barrel).

Front row.
Left. Cactus. Definitely Cereus 'Fairy castle'.
Middle. Succulent. Echeveria. probably a species called pulvinata.
Right. Succulent. Sedum. Not sure what species. It needs to be grown in higher light and with less water. It's starting to 'stretch'.
posted by meech at 3:20 PM on February 9, 2008

Seconding meech's friend on the front right--that's not a jade.

It looks like the succulent at back left is about to bloom (or is a cool little mini-plant offshoot?). You might be able to get a more definite ID by comparing the flowers to pictures in a book or online.
posted by hippugeek at 5:02 PM on February 9, 2008

Photos of various sedum species
posted by hippugeek at 5:09 PM on February 9, 2008

Thank you for all of the suggestions!

I agree that the front right plant is not a jade tree -- I've had jade trees before and this one is definitely different (color, leaves, stem).

I'll look out for aloe and lithops, they look cool.
posted by puffin at 4:39 AM on February 10, 2008

Based on hippugeek's link I'm guessing the front-right one is a Sedum pachyphyllum.
posted by puffin at 4:48 AM on February 10, 2008