Dracaena and Yucca are routinely mistaken for each other. Walk into any garden centre and you will find them side by side on the “indoor plants” shelf, both sold as easy-care foliage specimens with rosettes of sword-shaped leaves atop bare trunks. The confusion runs deep enough that even plant labels sometimes get the names wrong.… Continue reading Dracaena vs Yucca: Identification, Cultivation and Key Differences
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Aeonium Dormancy
Every summer, succulent forums and social media groups fill with the same panicked question: “My aeonium is dropping all its leaves, the rosettes are closing up, and it looks like it’s dying — what’s wrong?” The answer, almost always, is: nothing. Your aeonium is dormant. It is doing exactly what 40 million years of evolution… Continue reading Aeonium Dormancy
How to Propagate Aeonium: Stem Cuttings, Offsets, Beheading, and Seed
Aeoniums are among the easiest of all succulents to propagate — but the method you use, and the timing, depends entirely on which type of aeonium you are growing. The genus contains approximately 40 species with radically different growth forms: multi-branched tree aeoniums that yield abundant stem cuttings, clump-forming rosette species that produce basal offsets,… Continue reading How to Propagate Aeonium: Stem Cuttings, Offsets, Beheading, and Seed
How to Grow and Care for Aeonium: The Complete Guide
Aeonium is a genus of approximately 40 species of rosette-forming succulent plants in the family Crassulaceae, native to the Canary Islands, Madeira, Cape Verde, Morocco, and — remarkably — the highlands of East Africa and Yemen. Often called tree houseleeks, aeoniums are among the most ornamental and architecturally varied of all succulents, ranging from flat… Continue reading How to Grow and Care for Aeonium: The Complete Guide
Cold Hardy Aloes: Which Species Survive Frost Outdoors?
Most aloes are frost-tender — their gel-filled leaves freeze, the cells burst, and the plant turns to mush. But a surprising number of species from the high-altitude grasslands, mountain slopes and winter-cold plateaus of southern Africa tolerate temperatures well below freezing and can be grown outdoors year-round in climates far colder than most gardeners realise.… Continue reading Cold Hardy Aloes: Which Species Survive Frost Outdoors?
Aloe not flowering
Aloes are flowering plants. In their natural habitats across southern and eastern Africa, Madagascar and the Arabian Peninsula, mature aloes bloom reliably every year, producing striking racemes of tubular flowers in shades of red, orange, yellow, coral and pink that attract sunbirds, bees and other pollinators. Yet most cultivated aloes — particularly those grown indoors… Continue reading Aloe not flowering
How to Propagate Aloes: Offsets, Cuttings, Seeds and Micropropagation
Aloes can be multiplied in four fundamentally different ways, each suited to a different situation: division of offsets (the easiest and most reliable method for home growers), stem and leaf cuttings (a useful fallback when offsets are unavailable), seed (the only way to produce new genetic individuals and the method of choice for species conservation… Continue reading How to Propagate Aloes: Offsets, Cuttings, Seeds and Micropropagation
Aloe Root Rot: Pathogens, Diagnosis, Treatment and Prevention
Root rot is the leading cause of death in cultivated aloes. It is not a single disease but a collective term for infections caused by several different soil-borne organisms — primarily the oomycetes (water moulds) Pythium and Phytophthora, and the true fungi Fusarium and Rhizoctonia — that attack and destroy the root system of a… Continue reading Aloe Root Rot: Pathogens, Diagnosis, Treatment and Prevention
Aloe Thrips (Hercinothrips dimidiatus): An Emerging Pest of Aloes in Europe — Identification, Damage and Control
Hercinothrips dimidiatus Hood is a tiny thrips of South African origin that has emerged in the last decade as a serious and spreading pest of cultivated aloes across southern Europe. First detected in Portugal in 2012 on Aloe arborescens, it has since been recorded in Italy (Sicily, 2021), France (Corsica, 2018), the Netherlands (in a… Continue reading Aloe Thrips (Hercinothrips dimidiatus): An Emerging Pest of Aloes in Europe — Identification, Damage and Control
Overwatered Aloe: How to Recognise the Signs, Rescue the Plant and Prevent It from Happening Again
Overwatering kills more aloe plants than drought, frost and pests combined. This is not an exaggeration — aloes evolved in the semi-arid savannas and rocky hillsides of southern and eastern Africa, where their roots experience weeks or months of completely dry soil between infrequent rain events. Their thick, gel-filled leaves are biological water tanks designed… Continue reading Overwatered Aloe: How to Recognise the Signs, Rescue the Plant and Prevent It from Happening Again