Succulents Blog

Images and information about 'Succulents Blog'  will now be found in  'kaowinston succulents' located at   http://winston.blog.co.uk/    

 A walk on the promenade of San Remo in Italy,. coffee at the local cafetaria, later lunch at a restaurant in the old town, and another walk along the promenade studying the landscape inland.

    Headed to St. Etienne in France on my way to Lyon. It was one of these Ryanair budget  flight.  Stayed at the Ibis, and discovered that Lyon was far more interesting than I imagined.  Did the market stalls, surveyed the architecture, and then discovered the botanical gardens, in Parc de la Tete D'or.  The succulents collection was a dream.  Look at the photos below.

  Finally managed to.get some photos of the pereskia aculeata at the kew gardens in London.  This is a plant that I have grown for the last six years, but have never managed to get to produce flowers.  I will keep trying.

17/09     This is the time of the year when the weather begins to change.  Last night, the temperature fell below 10 degrees C, a sure sign that autumn is on its way.  In the greenhouse things are a little better, the day temperature still manages to rise to 30 C.  But for how long?

15/9     For the first time I have a flower from my adenium somalense var nova, even though it is only one foot tall.

10/09     Fruits of the cyphostemma juttae are pictured below.  This photo is from the Le jardin de Exotique in Monaco.  I find this plant difficult plant to grow.  I have two young plants, and they are growing slowly.

08/09     Five days in the south of france with glorious weather.  Visited the Arenas close to Nice airport, an ingenious mixture of outdoor and indoor tropical plants plus a few animals and an quarium thrown in.Enough there to keep you busy for hours.  Another visit  to the Jardin de Exotique.in Monte Carlo.  Lots of photos taken and this time the weather was better.  All along the coast there were succulents everywhere.  Pictured below is the variegated form of the opuntia monocantha.

01/09     Another trip to Berlin, and yes another visit to one of my favourite  botanical garden.  Also visited a few nurseries.  Got myself an adenium with flowers.

26/08     Visited the botanical garden, in Munich, Germany.  The greenhouse collection was quite amazing, and included a large display of succulents  There was also a special section dedicated to caudiciforms, and that was quite impressive.   .

Munich Botanical Garden

16/08     Was up in a Glasgow, Scotland for the day.  Visited the gardens most of whch was ok.  They are repairing the big Kibble Palace.   The cactus section could do with a bit of a make over.

03/08     Started sowing seeds which I ordered from Kohres Online.  I had the chance of visiting him and his operation at his home in Darnstad, germany.A.  I was quite impressed

29/07     In Frankfurt for a few days, I visited the Palmengarten,and was quite impressed with it all. Of course, the succulent collection was where I spent most of my time. And there was a lot to see.   I did enjoy having a look at the reserve collecion which was visible from behind the glass.   But themost impressive part of the collection was the Uncarinas.   The following day I visited Uhlig Kakteen Nursery in Kernen, outside Stuttgart, where I bought some plants

Uncarina roesoeliana at the Palmengarten in Frankfurt.

15/07     This was a very busy weekend for me,  I was based in Cologne, and stayed at the Ibis hotel.. Started at the local botanic garden which had an interesting collection.   On Saturday visited Erkelenz to purchase some caudiciforms from the famous Exotica Nursery.   On Sunday it I travelled to Bochum to view another collection.   Again it was quite impressive, and well worth the visit.   On the final day I made a rush visit to Bonn.   Did a quick tour of the city, and had a quick look at he Botanical Garden.

12/07     A sign of summer with flowers from this echinocereus parkeri at Kew Gardens, London.

1/04   Above, euphorbias growing easily along the coast of Malaga in Spain.   The Spanish frequenly use succulents to landscape their highways.

23/03   Later that sme tday, I visited the Hanbury Botanical Garden, another place more than worth a visit.

  A visit to Bordighera, Italy, very close to the border with France. Here I came across the Pallanca Exotic Garden, overflowing with succulents.   Truly worth a visit if you are in the area.

Kew gardens in the month of February, tylecodon panicatulus in theforeground..

January     Memories of Florida for a week,and many visits to nurseries and gardens.  Discovered this euphorbia punicata.   I have two young plants from seeds collected, and I am praying that they will survive.

    Four weeks in Trinidad and there was quite a lot to see.  Surprisingly, the private garden seem to be much more important.  There was little in the way of organised collections, and that was a shame.  The botanical garden is on the wane.  The trees are still there. but the organsation is absent.  What is needed is a committee of friends to support it.  Private gardens are still the norm, and I observed some interesting plants.  Succulents were not very popular, and was grown mainly by specialists. Yet, the trees were interesting.

  Memories of Abuquerque   After my visit to Arizona, it was back to Flagstaff.  The next day it was a visit to to the famous Grand Canyon.

    Memories ofArizonia, and in particular the Arizona Botanical garden, which was magnificwent.

13/11/04 This group of succulents were photographed at The Huntington Botanical Gardens in San Marino in California.   Truly a magnificent place for all kind of plants.   And certainly the best collection of succulents that I have seen anywhere.