Avonia quinaria (4 pics)

I feel like I need to read up on Avonia's (as well as Anacampseros) yearly growing cycle again. It seems they are in an active growth phase now, having flowered for the last time in October. I thought they are supposed to be resting in winter. Maybe they will. It's not winter yet.

Avonia quinaria plants are not very difficult to grow on the windowsill (in pure pumice) and they will flower for you, too. The main cause of death is overwatering. I made a mistake once - I thought the thick root will increase in size if I buried it. The only thing that came out of it was a dead plant, rotten from the inside, and a resolve not to do this ever again. You see, the only clear way of telling whether an Avonia quinaria needs water, at least for me, is to squeeze the raised root a bit. Sure if the plant needs water the branches might drop a little. But depending on the time of the year those branches might be too short to drop visibly. So from now on they all will grow raised and looking like palm trees. Much safer this way.

This Avonia quinaria ssp. quinaria (that's the one with pink flowers) is particularly pretty this year. It has grown many new branches and looks very happy. 

My four younger Avonia quinaria ssp. quinaria plants are actively growing right now, too.

I also have two Avonia quinaria ssp. alstonii plants (that's the white flowering kind). This one has really long branches.

This one has not been doing too well this year but is hanging in there. For a while it didn't seem to accept water and was shriveling. I think it's slowly getting better now though. The root is much firmer and new branches have started growing, too. It probably lost roots at some point which are now growing back.