Current flowers (7 pics)

I could catch the first Anacampseros flowers of the season recently. Good thing these two seem to be opening their flowers around 6 pm. Perfect timing to witness them after work. Of course the light is not ideal for taking pictures but it's possible to take some eerie atmospheric ones. After all, as you know, Anacampseros flowers open only once and only for a couple of hours at most. You make the best of it.

Both An. lancifolia and An. lanceolata grow very big flowers on long flower stalks. It must be hard to hold them up and so they are a bit droopy. I tried to pollinate both. I think it worked for the white one. The pink one, I don't know. It looked to me like there were no pollen to use. Just look at the picture.

An. lancifolia 

An. lanceolata

For some reason it seems like a good year for Frithias. Not only my old plants have grown flowers (one of them is still at it) but also my own 4 year old seedlings have flowered this year. This is amazing! The two seedlings are grown from seeds under a name of Frithia pulchra f. rubra (from Kakteen-Haage). I know there are red flowering Frithias out there, I saw comparison pics. Looks like what I've got was the regular kind after all. Seeing them bloom for the first time is fascinating nevertheless.

Completely the same color, right? :D I tried to cross-pollinate but don't know if it took. There's one more flower coming up on the second seedling and others growing on another older plant. But the timing is slightly off. We'll see.

Also, you remember these little guys? One of them is growing a flower now, too! It took 5 years!

UPDATE

This just in. The Adenium obesum I grew from seed has opened its first flower ever! Lots of firsts this year! Maybe the long dark winter was not as bad for the plants as I thought :)

Adenium's fresh green

On August 20th I've posted this photo of this plant.  I've decided not to prune just yet and wait for the spring. I think it was a good decision because this is how it reacted to the recent repotting :)

Two of the other Adeniums from this post are growing new leaves as well.

Adenium (7 pics)

Check out these butts! :D

I have sown these Adeniums in 2008 or 2009, sometime before I went to study in Japan, and never picked them up from my parents after that (no room and all). My mother has been taking very good care of them and the caudex part of the plants looks great! The green part however doesn't really want to grow properly so I took them back now to see if I can help with that. My parents don't really find them pretty so maybe they will once they see how they can bloom ;)

The substrate I used now is a mix of cacti soil and pumice, the containers are deep to give them more "leg" room. If I remember correctly the one with narrow leaves is an A. somalense. The one without leaves will need some trimming but I read it is better done before spring (?). The largest is 13 cm in diameter. Any advise on how to get them to grow the upper part?