Flowers in Bloom

This is a somewhat unusual December topic on succulents, particularly since the large majority of these plants have already finished their flowering and are now in their "resting" or dormancy stage. But a few plants in my collection have been putting out flowers over the last two months or so; some are natural late-bloomers, but others are a bit surprising.

I really wanted to entitle this piece "Succulent Blooms in Time for Christmas," but alas, not enough plants were in flower at this time of the year, hence the abbreviated title. So I’ve taken the liberty of including a few spring and summer flowering plants for now to spice things up. You should expect a sequel to this article in the May-August horizon, when most succulents are in bloom.

This article is also a bit unusual as it is my first one where not only Johann Espiritu’s photos are featured. It’s actually impossible for Johann to keep coming over to take a picture whenever a particular plant is in flower. Fortunately, the last time Johann was around in late November, a few plants were blooming, and these he has captured with his usual artistry and precision.

Another featured photographer in this issue is my good friend Evelyn Singson, who took the two springtime photos of cacti flowering in absolute abundance in the annual Chelsea Flower Show in England. Absolutely amazing! My sister Joy, an archaeologist by profession, who was based in London, the mecca of archaeology, for many years regularly attended the Chelsea show. She used to tell me about all these cacti flowering profusely and magnificently. I could only imagine what these looked like then as Joy never bothered with a camera. Thanks to Evelyn, I now have the pictures to match my sister’s descriptions.

Another set of photos was taken by another good friend and fellow avid collector, Peter Bangayan. Peter happened to visit me one June afternoon and took a number of plants in bud and in bloom. Peter has contributed to Succulentophile in the past, and will be contributing a number of other articles in the future.

The last featured photographer is none other than my son, Ethan, who has a good eye with the camera. He took the rest of the photos featured here, including a number with one of Johann’s old digital cameras. Besides his quality photos, the nice thing about Ethan is he’s right there when I need him to photograph a plant in bloom. That is, when he’s not in school or attending his violin lessons or Boy Scouts or sports activities, of course.

Now let’s get down to these magnificent blooms. For the most part, I find succulent blooms to be among the most beautiful and exquisite of all flowers, rivaling even rose and orchid flowers. In countries with temperate climates like the UK and US, many succulents bloom in the spring and early summer, right after their winter dormancy period. This flowering period happens to coincide with the new growth period for these plants, which typically starts around March and lasts up through around September or thereabouts. In the Philippines, and more particularly in Metro Manila, we also have this same growth and flowering cycle, but we just don’t get the abundance of blooms because of our tropical climate. As mentioned before, most cacti and some other succulents require hot days but cool nights to entice flower production. The cool winter resting periods provided in temperate climes also play a critical role in the flowering process. But I’ll be happy with whatever I can get out of my plants in my limited microenvironment, for now anyway.

There are natural late-bloomers, genera which in the wild flower after the summer is over, mainly in fall and even through the winter periods (i.e., the months from October through February). Among these are Ariocarpus and Conophytums. The Ariocarpus, in particular, flower spectacularly, as shown by the two examples here – the A. fissuratus v. fissuratus flowered in November, and the A. retusus hybrid is still flowering as I write this article. It is so incredible sometimes to associate these beautiful flowers with these rugged and weather-worn Living Rocks. The spectacular thing about the A. retusus flower is that A. retusus naturally produces creamish white to white flowers, nothing like the violet pink flowers in this example. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to get these plants to flower consistently in my tropical conditions, so whenever one of these plants flowers, it is a most memorable occasion for me. Again, the interplay of hot days and cool nights is required for optimum performance. Baguio and Tagaytay come to mind here.

Conophytums, those living marbles from South Africa, are winter-growers and flower at this time of the year. I particularly like yellow flowers, my favorite color, and both C. aff. Longibracteatum and C. maughanii ssp. armeniacum are fortunately happy to oblige me. Speaking of yellow flowers, the genus Astrophytum has absolutely magnificent yellow blooms! I have several examples here, mostly flowering in July through August, although one plant, A. myriostigma cv. Onzuka, chose to put out its last flowers in October. My favorite here is A. asterias, the sea urchin cactus; the example shown is a particularly old specimen measuring in excess of five inches in diameter which flowers regularly and profusely for me.

Cactus and other succulent flowers come in every imaginable color, with the exception of pure blue. Some blooms are spectacularly large, such as the blooms produced by certain tropical cacti like Hylocereus and "Orchid Cacti" which one occasionally sees growing in a number of gardens in Metro Manila. I don’t grow these plants, but because these grow in tropical South America, many can withstand – in fact, even thrive in our Metro Manila climate. But the most widespread are the medium-sized to small flowering types. Haworthias, epithelanthas and mammillarias generally produce smallish blooms. Turbinicarpus, strombocactus and astrophytums produce more medium-sized flowers.

There are other interesting flowering specimens I would like to point out here. Euphorbia turbiniformis flowering is a sight to behold, with its small, funny-looking blooms. This Somalian plant is one of the great rarities in all of the succulent world, and it is also one of the most beautiful. Discocactus horstii, a very rare Brazilian cactus, is shown here flowering in November. This is a night-blooming species which produces a wonderful, sweet fragrance like dama de noche. This scent is used to attract night-feeding moths that have probosces several centimeters long. Flowers of discocacti, which are exclusively pollinated by these nocturnal moths, produce a very long flower tube, and open toward evening, often only for a few hours. To ensure that these flowers are clearly visible in the dark, these blooms are usually quite large, almost always white, and produce a strong perfume-like scent. The other interesting thing about Discocactus flowers is that these are produced from what is called a cephalium which grows on top of mature plants of this genus. The cephalium is a section of the plant with an entirely different spine formation from the rest of the plant, usually very hairy/wooly. Flowers on Discocacti are not produced until this cephalium develops.

Speaking of strong scents, another succulent group has a very different kind of scent used to attract its insect pollinators. Stapeliads, represented here by the flowering and very rare Pseudolithos migiurtinos and Trichocaulon meloforme, produce blooms that have a carrion-like (or rotting flesh) and very foul smelling stench, used to attract flies. I had Johann and my son Kirby put their noses up close to the flower, and elicited the appropriate facial grimace from each. I personally observed a number of large horseflies and bangaws feasting on the Pseudolithos flowers. The end result is the spear-like fruit as shown in the photo, which produces 30 or so seeds when ripe. I have since planted some of the harvested seeds and produced a number of seedlings of this very rare specimen. More on succulent seed-raising in the future.

I mentioned earlier that there are a few cacti flowering right now in December, which surprised me. These are the Turbinicarpus. In the wild, this genus of beautiful Mexican cacti normally flowers in March through to September, maybe even stretching to October. So it is quite interesting to see a number of species like T. panarottoi and T. jauernigii flowering at this time of the year, particularly when the direct sunlight into my greenhouse is all but gone at this time (although I have bright light year-round). Of course, for me, any succulent flower at any time of the year is most welcome, particularly at the end of the year near Christmastime, when flower production is at its lowest.