Well, it happened, the thing we feared most of the impending winter season…. we lost some succulents, actually, we lost quite a few succulents from our outdoor greenhouse
The hardest hit crop was our lucky Jade (Crassula ovata) — not so lucky, eh? I had *luckily* brought a few small cuttings inside the garage; the mother and giant plants are completely ruined, they have lost their characteristic firmness as their leaves hold water (more water than say a skinny echeveria plant) they are now plush & squishy (like play dough and soggy bread feeling) and quite sad looking indeed.
All the plants were looking fine as we came back from our Thanksgiving trip… And then the couple nights of freezing temperatures hit us. After installing a thermometer in the greenhouse, I watched the temperatures drop down to as low as 26 degrees F two nights in a row, even with a heat lamp installed! I should have brought everything inside the first time it got that cold— I did not… Tested out the hardiness of the plants and mother nature taught Suburban Succulents a lesson.
Mind you, not all of our succulents have been harmed! There are quite a few that are not *yet* showing signs of overall damage, so that is a relieving feeling.
Ultimately we have settled on moving all of the succulents inside for the rest of winter. Our garage and downstairs living space is filled with succulent containers and flats! I am happy that the succulents get to enjoy a warmer place– although we are now changing out the cold weather for sub-par lighting issues in the rooms… We shall see where this takes us!
The next job, which I didn’t realize was going to become a job this early in the year, is to replant and categorize our succulent collection according to types. No more of our random flat growing days– we are going to divide and conquer- hopefully, making it easier to inventory with the continual growth of the business.
Catch up with you next week on the progress of all this- and a total assessment of our succulent loss due to the freezing temperatures.