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At least 4 flowers couldn't fully develop this year. But no need to complain :) At least some could make it.  This L. localis for instance. Also, how come I didn't know Conophytum obcordellum opens its flowers at night?

I had to post this photo. This guy is just the cutest little thing ♥

Also, this is happening :)

It's gotten too cramped in my pot with young mesemb seedlings so I've transplanted the biggest - Aloinopsis malherbei - away from the others yesterday. This is their first root check. :) The second plant from the left is actually a month older than others and it does look more like an adult.  Also, while pulling out the A. malherbei I've pulled out a couple of the A. schooneesii to find nice carrot-roots. Those are pretty thick if you see them in relation to the plants themselves. Hopefully they will grow into some impressive caudiciforms in a couple of years (more like 10 years...).

It was a relatively sunny weekend and another lithops flower opened :) The unidentified lithops might be salicola or julii greenie and the flower has a sweet honey fragrance (I always smell lithops flowers but this is the first time I could smell something XD ).

Time to introduce new plants to you and to this blog. I've had these two Gibbaeum geminum for a couple of months and they seem to feel fine so far. They grow very slowly but react to water quite well. They are much much smaller than I imagined seeing them on photos online! One of them is growing in a pot with two Conophytum plants. The photo is being photobombed by a Nananthus aloides :D The other one shares its pot with a Neohenricia sibbettii cutting and an Adromischus marianae v. herrei (green form). Maybe it's not the best choice for neighbors but it'll have to do for now...

You remember two weeks ago I told you that my Avonia quinaria ssp. alstonii has grown 3 seed pods without being pollinated or even having a suitable partner. I collected approximately 50 seeds that looked viable in their size and shape and then sowed half of them in a pot occupied by some other mesemb seedlings, simply out of curiosity. Only a day later these fresh seeds indeed started to hatch! Some of them looked week and crippled and died just as soon as they germinated but at the end of this week I can count 6 seedlings that gradually increase in size (and another 6 that just hatched but do look good). This is quite interesting because growers don't consider Avonia quinaria a self-fertile Avonia. But apparently it does happen. I am not clear on what actually induces selfing in them. I've had Avonia flowers before but never seed pods.