Monday, August 11, 2014

Monilaria waking up

Don't know about you but I find these bunny ears simply adorable! :)
Monilaria chrysoleuca is waking up from its summer sleep. You can clearly see the two types of leaves at this stage - round ones and bunny ears. Curious plant. I'd love to grow more of them but I keep killing seedlings at leaf-set number two. Will try sowing in the fall again.

This is my first year growing Monilaria and I was very worried it will not wake up. What a relief.

9 comments:

  1. Very cute! I have some monilaria moniliformis seedlings which have their first set of bunny ears emerging. Do you have any advice for getting them to the second set of leaves?

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    1. It is! :)

      Unfortunatelly I wasn't able to grow them past the second set of leaves. In the Mesembs of the World it says they should be sown in the fall so maybe that's why. I will try again...
      At the moment I only have one tiny seedling, still with bunny ears...

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  2. Какой симпатяга! Сейчас он больше напоминает рожки олененка чем кроличье ушки! :)

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    1. Да, вполне возможно :)
      Очень радуюсь что не сгинул))) О то стоит коряга и непонятно, жив или мертв))

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  3. Hi Rika,
    They should call these winter growing mesembs resurrection plants because they appear dead and then suddenly come to life. Your new growth is a little early but individual plants will grow at their own pace, and we (growers) just must adapt. The appearance of the bunny ears is a signal to start watering. The bunny ears should grow relatively fast providing there is adequate moisture available. This is the time of year when Monilaria needs as much sun as possible in order to build up its food supply in order to flower in early to mid winter. Thus whether or not you get flowers may depend on your weather conditions over the next few months. Lots of sunny day, flowers are possible. Lots of cloudy, dull days, maybe no flowers. This is where a greenhouse gives an advantage. However, you have successfully brought your Monilaria through its summer dormany and that's valuable experience for you.

    Part of the difficulty with seedlings of many of the mesembs is they just don't have the amount of water storage that adult plants have. In addition, as juveniles they may not have developed their yearly cycles. The seedlings usually need a little more pampering in terms of water than the adult plants. Keep them too dry and you lose them. Keep them too wet and you may rot them. Such is the life of a mesemb seed grower. But it's all exciting right? I think so too. ^__^

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    1. Thank you for explaining the phenomenon Monilaria to me (now and before)! This is the first year growing it for me and I was very confused with its yearly life cycle. Now it's much clearer to me. At least in theory. In practice I'll just do my best.
      More and more buds are waking up now and my understanding is that the plants should grow like grass for a while which means early awakening shouldn't be a problem (except for possible sunburns maybe? It's not that sunny anymore so let's hope not). In terms of light... well, the weather has a say in this, not me. I'm not even hoping to see the flowers :D It's absolutely fine with me to just see it grow the leaves and then go into dormancy at an appropriate time. That's would be a great success :)

      Seedlings have turned out to be difficult. They germinate fine, then grow bunny ears and then die. Can't keep them alive until the round leaves yet but I'll keep trying. I just read in Mesembs of the World that the seeds should be sown in the fall so that's what I'm going to do. Hopefully it helps. I still have a lot of seeds from Mesa Garden to try :)
      Btw, still no success with Muiria. They germinate, stay with their cotyledons for months then die without ever developing proper leaves. I currently have only one plant that has developed first true leaves which came out through the side with cotyledons still there. It is alive and green but no other progress since months. But at lease it got this far. We'll see.
      Still some seeds left to try another sowing in the fall.

      It is exciting no matter what ;)

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  4. Very cool :) I saw this plant many years ago in botanical garden... Amazing.

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    1. It truely is! Thank you!
      I'm still very new to this so it is quite amazing to me too. I really hope to be able to grow it well and have more of these plants in the future.

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  5. What substrate do you use to seed Conophytum and Monilaria. I have acquired some seeds and would like to start them now too.

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