Surreal Succulents

There are roughly 35 species of Aeonium which are members of the Crassulaceae family. Most Aeonium species are native to the Canary Islands, but they can also be found in Madeira, Morocco, Cape Verde Islands and the East Coast of Africa.

Aeoniums are succulents that can survive in extremely dry and arid environments, they achieve this by storing water in their leaves and stems. Aeoniums come in many shapes and sizes, from the ornamental Aeonium ‘Medusa’ to the giant form of Aeonium ‘Pomegranate’ down to the tiny species Aeonium Aizoon.

Aeoniums are surprisingly incredibly easy to grow and require very little care and maintenance. In general, it is best to use a free-draining soil mix and keep your plants frost-free over the winter. You can use horticultural fleece to protect your Aeoniums from frost and hail stones if planted in the garden or potted up outside.

Most Aeoniums love full sun or part shade, the darker leaf varieties in particular love full sun, some other varieties of Aeonium such as the variegated forms and the Aeonium Tabuliforme, prefer part-shade or morning sunshine. 

Growing season

Aeoniums can grow all year round if the conditions suit them, but their main growing season is in the Spring and Autumn.

In the longer, hotter summer days you may see your Aeoniums becoming dormant, they prefer to grow in the cooler months’ each side of summertime. You can tell when your Aeoniums become dormant as the colours may darken right to the centre of the heads, or the heads of each rosette will bud or close like a rose bud. 

Dormant Aeoniums will shut down and not require any feeding or watering. It’s a bit like them going to sleep, over watering whilst dormant can kill your plants as they can suffer from stem or root rot. Just simply wait until the heads open up again before looking after them as normal.

You can move your Aeoniums to a cooler area with less light or a shady spot to stop this dormancy period, moving these plants will extend the amount of growth you will get in one season. 

During the winter months an Aeonium is still capable of growing but at a much slower rate, this is due to the overall temperature which is especially important during the night. The ideal growing night time temperatures for Aeoniums is between 12-16°C, and daytime temperatures between 18-22°C.

Growth and flowering

Aeoniums mainly grow in Spring and Autumn, feeding and watering the plants at these times of year will encourage plenty of growth.

Aeoniums don’t only possess great presence and structure but many varieties put on the most impressive flowering display. They produce large conical shaped flowering heads, these are covered in hundreds of daisy shaped flowers, each one packed full of sweet nectar that bees and insects absolutely adore. Flowering tends to be early in the growing season and can last for several months.

Soil mix

A simple compost mix for Aeoniums is 60% multi-purpose compost with 40% grit or perlite. This mix allows excellent drainage and air to move through the root system to encourage good robust, and healthy growth.

Watering Aeoniums 

A general rule for watering Aeoniums is to thoroughly drench the soil then let it dry out completely between waterings. If growing the plants outside in large pots or a garden during the summer, leave the watering to mother nature. If growing undercover then we recommend watering in the early mornings for best results.

Growing the perfect Aeonium

If you’re growing in pots or in the garden, the most important part of growing a big Aeonium is to establish a large root system. As Aeoniums grow the stems can become elongated, we recommend that when re-potting or planting out your Aeonium always bury the majority of the exposed stem deeper into the soil, this will encourage more roots and impressive growth. Another important point to consider is how these roots will be when the plant is large, as many Aeoniums can be top heavy, these extra roots will anchor your plant in position, and support it in strong winds.

To achieve a large root system, you want your plant to be hungry, this encourages root growth in search for food. 

We recommend planting Aeoniums in a fresh soil mix in the garden or in a pot. This fresh mix will usually contain enough food for one growing season. This will boost the plant and give it enough energy to establish a good anchor into the ground or pot. Once a large root system has been achieved, you can begin feeding. After the first year you can then use a standard good all-round feed or a slow-release fertilizer, water in a balanced soluble feed every two months to supplement the best Aeonium growth. If pot grown, you can repot each season. When repotting, it’s a good idea to clean off as much of the old soil as possible then pot up with a fresh soil mix, we always use this technique for our show plants.

Pest and Diseases

It’s important to always take good care of your succulents. A quick weekly visual inspection is a good way of keeping an eye on any pests or diseases that may affect your plants.

Many pests can affect Aeoniums such as Mealybugs, Aphids, Vine weevil, Caterpillars, slugs and snails.

Many pests like vine weevils can be treated with different types of Nematodes. Some pests like snails, caterpillars and mealy bugs can be manually removed, mealy bugs can also be treated with a 70% isopropanol mix. 

Aeonium trends

There are so many amazing Aeonium hybrids, such as the giant Aeonium ‘Pomegranate’, Aeonium ‘Voodoo’, Aeonium Tabuliforme x Nobile as well as hardy Aeoniums such as Aeonium ‘Phoenix Flame’ and sister seedling Aeonium ‘Emerald Flame‘ which are surprisingly hardy to  minus 7°C.

There are many variegated Aeoniums, which are sports or mutated forms of these already amazing Aeoniums. Many variegated forms were produced in China where they use many methods such as grafting, adjusting the PH of the soil mixes and even chemicals to educe or encourage plants to become variegated. It used to be incredibly rare to have a stable variegated Aeonium, as these would normally only occur from natural sports or mutations but now there are many new varieties available. 

Variegated varieties are well known for a slower growth rate than non-variegated forms, this is due to the lack of chlorophyll in the leaves to photosynthesise.  A massive advantage variegated Aeoniums have is the ability to grow brilliantly in lower light levels, they can be used to under plant larger plants or shady parts of the garden that need a bit brightening up during the summer. 

Variegated Aeoniums tend to need protection from the winter cold, and frosts

Growing tips

• Grow in a bright sunny location
• Use a free draining soil mix
• Establish a large root system to maximise growth rates 
• Once established feed regularly in the growing season
• Water when dry and completely drench the plants and allow to dry again before watering, Drench Drain Dry 
• Keep frost free over winter 

Aeoniums

We have a wide range of Aeoniums available on the website.

Shop Aeoniums

Haworthia come in a fantastic range of unusual shapes and colours from spiralling formation to geometric sculptural forms. They are mainly slow-growing plants, most of which enjoy warmer temperatures and don’t require intense light, making them well suited to life indoors. The majority of the Haworthia growing season is in the wintertime. They come in a range of unique colours with many popular hybrids coming out of Asia.

Haworthia are native to South Africa where they can be found growing camouflaged in arid and rocky outcrops, they have adapted to survive in extreme heat with little water required. They are closely related to Gasteria and Aloe and often referred to as rock plant or crystal plants.

They grow in rocky outcrops to disguise themselves from animals, so not to be eaten for their moisture content. Due to this, Haworthia have the most impressively tall flower spikes, this is so they can attract pollinators without exposing their location to thirsty animals. They also have tiny flowers on their very thin flower spikes which are pollinated by flying insects.

Haworthia grow in the sweltering temperatures and will not tolerate frosts or cold weather so are best grown indoors or overwinter in a greenhouse.

Amazing

These plants can be impressive artistically sculptural in growth formation with the most fascinating features, of these being their translucency fleshy parts. Giving these plants the nickname window plants as you can literally look into the centres of the leaves and plants. Haworthia are a talking point in any collection, they are very photogenic for social media platforms with all of their exciting and unusual features.

Colour

One of the most enjoyable parts in growing Haworthia is the impressive range of colours you can achieve in your plants from different heat and light conditions. In low light, they can have a very lush appearance, whereas when grown in hot and intense light levels, they can take on a different array of colouration. There are even hybrids with golden metallic lines in the leaves that look electric.

There are many colourful variegated forms of these unusual plants, but due to the slow growth rates, they can command extremely high prices. The variegation can come in several colours from yellow to the highly collectable and rare pink and orange forms of many of these species.

Some Haworthia have a vast root system in comparison to the plant above. The roots can almost look like a hand made out of parsnips. With these large root systems, Haworthia are typically planted in ceramic pots as the root system can grow and reshape the pot when they run out of growing space.

In habitat, these plants grow very low in the ground with only the tips of the leaves visible, this isn’t necessary when potted as you can admire more of the plant when planted up higher.  

Growing tips

We use a grittier soil mix for all of our Haworthia, of 50 percent soil and 50 percent perlite and grit.

They will benefit from an extra thick layer of top-dress starting at the base of the plant.

You can feed them for faster growth rates, but it will have an influence on the colour with a lusher appearance.

Haworthia require very little water but make sure the soil is dry before its next watering, but water as you would with most succulents, drench the plant but avoid getting the crown of the plant wet.

If your plants look dehydrated, you can water more often or plant your Haworthia deeper into fresh substrate.

Happy plants will look full and plump with a shiny appearance.

Haworthia will enjoy feeding during their growing season.

Haworthia growers often trim the root system to encourage the plant to sprout more roots but be sure to let them heal before watering them. 

Aloe polyphylla also commonly known as the Spiral Aloe.

The Aloe polyphylla is a Surreal Succulents favourite, it has fantastic growth patterns and can withstand temperatures well below freezing. Making it a perfect outdoor all-year-round UK succulent.

The Aloe polyphylla is native to the Maluti mountains of Lesotho which is an area rich in minerals and high levels of winter snowfall, it is also the national plant of Lesotho.

The Aloe polyphylla breaks all the usual rules for keeping succulents. They are an incredibly thirsty and hungry plant that benefits from extra feeding and watering during the growing season. They respond by appreciating air to the root system and not drowning in water. This will cause their roots to rot, slowing down growth rates. To achieve a growing medium that will encourage root development, we use standard multipurpose compost at 55% then we add 35% of perlite and a further 10% grit to the mix. We also add a natural feed e.g. chicken muck.

As the Aloe grows, the bottom leaves of the Aloe polyphylla naturally dry out and die back. This process encourages new roots to develop, old leaves can be removed carefully by hand. When planting this succulent, it will benefit from being planted on a hump or mound. Angling the Aloe will encourage the water to run away from the leaves and to the root system.

• To appreciate its beautiful growth form, angle the Aloe in the garden or pot and admire the beautiful spiralling crown.
• One of the most unusual features of this Aloe is the fact that it can survive and thrive in temperatures well below freezing.
• This succulent has impressive growth rates when happy.
• The Aloe polyphylla is a hungry, thirsty plant and best kept outdoors.
• The perfect UK outdoor succulent, hardy to -15°C (on mature specimens).
• Plant in full sun on a mound and at an angle.
• Use a free-draining soil mix and add a natural feed.

For more information view our product page. The Aloe polyphylla is incredibly popular so we can’t guarantee it will always be in stock. Sign-up to our newsletter to be kept up to date when products come back into stock.

One of the most beautiful Aeonium species around, always drawing the attention at shows with it’s fascinating Fibonacci spiral and its compact and almost flat growing form.

The Aeonium tabuliforme is one of the more tender Aeoniums, it grows incredibly well outside but needs protection from frosts or ideally temperatures below 4°c. When planting this Aeonium it is best to slightly angle it so that water can freely run off from the crown (centre of the plant), it can even be planted vertically in walls and rockeries. In nature this plant can be found growing on the side of cliff faces so is well suited for vertical living.

This succulent is a great feature plant and will appreciate some shade but can tolerate full sun when planted at an angle. It also makes a great indoor house plant.

Plant in a good free draining soil mix, we feed our Aeonium tabuliformes in the spring so they can grow and shut down for the winter. Feeding less, leading into the winter months produces a tougher plant that has a higher chance of surviving the winter cold spells.

• Use a good free draining soil mix.
• Only feed in the spring.
• Angle the plant so water can freely drain off from the centre of the plant.
• The tabuliforme will tolerate shade making it a great house plant.
• Protect from frost and freezing temperatures.
• Doesn’t mind being pot bound.