Graptoveria opalina 🌱🌵🌱

This is the newest addition to my succulent collection and, as most of the times, I did not know the name of the variety I was buying. I just liked the idea of adding a new specimen to the collection. I was attracted by the soft colours and the meatiness of its leaves. I learned afterwards that this is what distinguishes this family of succulents, called graptopetalum, from other similar plants. Initially I thought this was just a variety of echeverias but I was told these are called graptoverias and are a hybrid variety coming from crossing echeverias with graptopetalum. The resulting variety has distinct features like the thickness of leaves and the blueish hues of colours. This gives them also the popular name of “ghost plant” because of the opalescent shades of its fleshy leaves.

Like the other plants in this family, the place of origin is the dry desert of Mexico and that tells us how to take care of this beauty. The best care we can give them is actually infrequent watering to avoid the root system gets rotting and the fleshy and waxy leaves are no longer functioning as storage place for the scarce water.
These are beautiful and tough creatures that are used to withstand harsh environments with little nutrients available around them. At the same time these are slow-growing species so they would look almost the same year after year. In spring they produce some reddish stems, with bright yellow bell-shaped flowers, that bend over with the weight of the cluster of flowers.
Propagation by leaves is the easiest way to get additional plants from one specimen. It is sufficient to detach a whole leaf from the mother plant and wait a few weeks until it germinates from the point where it was attached to the original stem. This way one can quickly generate many small baby plants from one year to the other. A real joy to look at them multiply so quickly.

My favourite succulents

Plants and Flowers

Photography 👨🏽‍💻❤️📷