Aloes in Arizona: Updated Observations

[raimeiken]

Spoke too soon. Both comosa melted yesterday it looks like. Then my mature variegated Tangerine in a terra cotta pot also rotted. I haven't watered them at all and are in shaded areas. At this rate, by the end of August, I'll have zero aloes left

[Melt in the Sun]

Quick lists for now, though I haven't looked at everything yet...got lots of small potted things under shade in the backyard, but I think those are probably all fine. I need more trees!

Dead:
congolensis
deltoideodonta v. fallax, one may survive
'Helskloof Bells'
glauca

Probably dead very soon:
aculeata
petrophila
scobinifolia
tongaensis

Singed but seem solid:
hemmingii
'Fire Ranch'
karasbergensis
lavranosii
littoralis
marlothii x globuligemma
microstigma
mudenensis
'Spiney'

Still looking really good:
broomii hybrid (x gariepensis?)
claviflora
dichotoma
gariepensis
gerstneri
globuligemma
'Hercules'
hereroensis
immaculata
medishiana
'Moonglow'
pseudorubroviolacea
tomentosa
"verdoorniae"
vigueri
zebrina

[mcvansoest]

Well I swear my 'Spiney' was fine this morning, but as I came home and was walking around taking pictures for another thread here I notice black ooze around the core. The core is still attached but I think I just saw the start of its demise. It looks like it has at least one decent sized offset that is doing OK so it may not be a total loss, but this plant had finally started looking really good... It is funny it has been a little cooler and I had been thinking the plants had managed to hang in there reasonably well... a few days later... poof... it makes me want to water, but I worry that is only going to make it worse... I sort of know it will...

Not a great start your weekend moment....

It is not that easy to see because of the sun angle but I think you can make the black ooze out:

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[Melt in the Sun]

Yeah that doesn't look good...

[Stan]

In the recent past you would get 5 days above 110F. This year 31 and counting sez the news guy.
How about Aloe dorothea and A.cameronii?

[toditd]

My potted A. cameronii is doing ok, considering the heat, I wouldn't say that it is thriving though. It is in shade for most of the day and I've been watering it once or twice a week. That's more than I watered it last year and it's doing much better than last year, not frying nearly as crispy. It's either let it burn to a crisp, or give it some water and hope that it deals with it ok. So far it's been ok with the watering. The lack of direct sun kinda ruins its form and color. Oh well, at least it is still alive. (Knock on wood.)

[mcvansoest]

In the recent past you would get 5 days above 110F. This year 31 and counting sez the news guy.
How about Aloe dorothea and A.cameronii?

The news guy is wrong about the recent past. He must have selective memory.... we may not have have had 31 consecutive days of 110+ (it only got to 108 today here in Tempe btw), but we certainly had many days of 110+ put in a 108 or 109 here and there to break the consecutive streak and I guess it does not look as bad, but the end result is pretty close. And above 108 everything is pretty much fucking hot.

My cameronii also in full shade is OK. No water since late June...

[eremophila]

I went out and did some watering today, mostly the potted plants, but sprinkled over some areas of the garden. Some observations:

My Aloe 'Spiney' is also toast. It was looking so great over the winter and spring but it's bleached to nothing and the stem has collapsed. Oh well.

I lost a tree branch in a corner that shaded things like a big Aloe dawei, Aloe hemmingii, Aloe medishiana and Aloe bussei. They're all incredibly rough looking, but might survive. Strangely, the bussei looks the best.

I had to pull out Aloe harlana and Aloe djiboutiensis from a spot where the sun fries them in the afternoon and, no surprise, but the djiboutiensis had no living roots. I feel like the sun hits one of my neighbor's windows in just the right way and reflects back onto my plants in some places. Some scorch looks like someone stood out there with a magnifying glass. Also pulled out a variegated brevifolia from a similar position as it was not blue at all anymore. They're all sitting in a shady corner with the pseudorubroviolacea from the previous mention.

Tossed an Aloe reynoldsii the other day and two Aloe aristata as well.

The cameronii I have is shriveled like it's not taking up water and the Aloe dorotheae looks grouchy and shriveled, but is surviving and looks better than the cameronii nearby. A potted dorotheae doesn't seem to mind life right now, but is on the yellow side.

Anything in the broad family of Crassulaceae is dead or nearly so, except the Kalanchoe rhombopilosa. I guess there are a handful of Kalanchoe 'Oak Leaf' planted around that are also doing fine, surprisingly. My large trio of K. beharensis are all suffering worse than they ever have and they're tucked up under the patio. The temperatures are easily the culprit here. I should have snagged a few leaves to propagate but there isn't much to work with right now. Where I had Echeverias doing well last year, all are gone now. The last Echeveria agavoides planted out died the other day. I was smart and brought in the Dudleyas and Graptopetalum to grow under LED lights for the summer, an Adromischus too.

I have an evil mouse eating through some softer potted aloes and haworthias. It has no interest in the baited traps I've set. I keep hoping a rattlesnake or a cat will stop by again. A few more irreplaceable favorites of each genus are also indoors under LED lights.

Maybe repeating myself, but here's a rundown from this morning:

Still looking good/decent under trees or shade cloth:
austrosudanica (potted)
bellatula (potted)
bertemariae
castilloniae (potted)
chabaudii
deltoideodonta (potted)
divaricata
ellenbeckii
fleurentiniorum
grisea
kilifiensis
kouebokkeveldensis
mendesii (potted)
molederana
niebuhriana
orlandi (potted)
omavandae (potted)
peckii (potted)
pirottae x hemmingii (potted)
prinslooi
rauhii (potted)
rugosifolia
scobinifolia
sinana
striata
veseyi (potted)
woodii

Rough looking, mostly from being overexposed, but will probably survive:
austroarabica
dawei
dhufarensis
elegans
eremophila
eumassawana
glauca spinosior
pseudorubroviolacea
trichosantha
schoelleri
sinkatana (=zubb)
tomentosa
vera
vera x eumassawana

Doubtful or dead:
aristata
gariepensis (small plant, overexposed, my own fault)
gilbertii
grisea x schelpei
maculata (the actual species, not the grandidentata or mac hybrid that's common in AZ)
menyharthii
reynoldsii
scabrifolia
'Spiney'
umfoloziensis
x fleurentiniorum

There are probably others, but we'll see how things turn out by November. We did get a bit more rain since my last post, fairly impressive storm that brought another 3/4 of an inch which brings my monsoon total to 1 inch...how sad compared to the last two years.

Two recent mornings were 75 and 78 respectively. I keep dreaming of 60 degree mornings that feel SO FAR AWAY still.

And so it goes,
J

[mcvansoest]

Sorry to hear about your additional casualties. I had some Agave casualties so my focus has been drawn away from the aloes for a bit. Every Aloe that had not been covered with shade cloth yet has been now to hopefully make further serious sun scorching less of an issue.

We got an unexpected storm early this morning 5-6AM or so, I heard the thunder and my rain gauge said 0.06" so not much, but it may have been a little better than the rain gauge says as there were puddles everywhere still when we hit the road. So probably a few hours of reasonably cool Ts, but those did not last - it was 104 at 9.30, better than yesterday when it was 106 at 7.45, but definitely not a 'oh this will be a cool day' kind of start.

We will have to see how the plants take that water. I suspect that given that it came with some cool down, that it will be better than my irrigation, but I always worry that these short little storms that bring rain and some temperature relief, but not all that much still do more harm that good. Keep hoping for some whopper that minus the wind will just drop Ts to the 70s for a few hours and leave half an inch of rain or so, but they way the summer has so far shaped up, I suspect we will not get any of those, in that regard it is pretty much like the summers of 19 and 20.

[eremophila]

Add kouebokkeveldensis to the list of casualties. I knew it was probably too good to be true about them surviving this summer. Both melted out last week. Oh well.
I pulled out the cameronii and it had no roots. One of the deltoideodonta candicans croaked last week as well.

One night recently was stormy and rainy thanks to the remains of Hilary passing by, though the gauge only showed another 1/4 inch. A handful of partly cloudy to overcast days and lower temps helped things out a bit. The last few mornings have been in the low 70s and it made it down to 68 the night of the storm.

Pumpkin themed items at the store appearing now, gives me hope that autumn is coming. I think we're over the hump at least...hopefully.

[Melt in the Sun]

A. aculeata and tongaensis finished dying over here, as did one of my 'Spiney'. I had one offset I didn't sell last year and put in a raised bed; it was becoming a decent size plant on its own and starting to offset, so that's a big loss to my propagation plans. I still have my big one potted and a large bulbil trying to root.

Everything else is more or less the same - we've had a couple inches of rain in the past week and temperatures have eased, so I've moved from "what's going to die next" to cautious optimism that what's still here has made it through.

[mcvansoest]

My Spiney is toast. Tongaensis may pull through. My main aculeata is looking good, but the one smaller one I had left has disappeared. vacillans actually is growin... and trichosantha has resumed flowering on one of its inflorescences... did not get inches of rain, but we got rain and lots of clouds and lower T's a few nights in the 70s have definitely helped plants.

We still have some 112s in the forecast but nothing crazy anymore - ie above 115... and night time lows are going down...

I do believe holding out with not watering and covering things in shade cloth helped a lot... a pity I did not cover plants until after Spiney started showing signs of being toast, but those arborescens genes may just not be great for this kind of heat. The offset still looked good on the weekend.

[eremophila]

Most of my hemmingii are coming into flower currently, so that'll at least at some color around here, albeit small splashes of it.

Melt, you're getting all the rain this summer! I feel like I'm in the "skipped over" zone this year. Stormy and lots of thunder passing overhead last night, but not a drop of rain. El Nino has brought cooler, wetter winters in the past, so maybe the deluge is yet to arrive.

No flowers on trichosantha here (yet), but the one citrina is finishing what it started earlier on. The couple I have from Arid Lands are not even remotely as pubescent as the plants offered by the Huntington a few years ago, which is a bummer.

That's all for today!
J

[Melt in the Sun]

Noticed today that A. microstigma melted under the shade cloth. Bummer.

In other news, tongaensis lives on to fight another summer...

[mcvansoest]

I posted it somewhere else, but my 'Hercules' is toast. I am going to chop the top of in the hope that the base and roots are intact and it can be convinced to grow a few new arms, but I am not optimistic.

Did not expect that tbh it appeared to have made it through the worst as it looked fine at the start of this month...

[Melt in the Sun]

Over the weekend we did some cleanup in preparation for fall plantings. I noticed I lost my largest 'Moonglow' too - sorry @eremophila! I still have a bunch of offsets and another large one from another source. Also missing entirely is globuligemma x marlothii. Only the tag is left, which makes me suspect javelina. I'll have to grab another one of those next time I'm down at Arid Lands - it still seems like a good contender for Arizona.

[mickthecactus]

Noticed today that A. microstigma melted under the shade cloth. Bummer.

In other news, tongaensis lives on to fight another summer...

The Stapelia looks pretty happy.

[Melt in the Sun]

The Stapelia looks pretty happy.

yep, not so much the others! I'm pretty sure that one's S. leendertziae, which has proven to be nigh unkillable here. Nearly all others are burnt to a crisp.

[mcvansoest]

Sorry about your aloes and stapeliads, Melt.

I had a look see under some shadecloth as well over the weekend and well the news was not all that good. Aloe africana, castaneae, and main head on my rupestris all gone. I think the rupestris might survive as it has plenty of basal branches that look fine.

Things that are good: tomentosa, aculeata, claviflora hybird, 'Swordfish', and a bunch of hybrids. Sabaea also grew a lot and even helenae came through fine. Tongaensis my still go the way of the other dead plants. A lot of the miniature bumpy aloes did fine a few are toast but most will be OK.

A lot of these hung on through most of the summer, and did not start to show their sudden decline until I would say late August early September. Same as the Hercules really. Most of my smaller potted aloes are toast as well. Not surprised by that it was just brutal.

I am going to attempt to put all of my larger Echinopsis plants in the ground this October. Not sure I have the space but a lot of my in the ground cacti came through the summer reasonably well, so I may just have to make it work. Makes me wish I had more shade in the front yard, but that is still years away. I am a bit discouraged now, but I am sure in a month's time that I will have found another Aloe to try....

There was a very strong correlation between being fine/OK and being in the shade most of the summer vs. toast immediately or towards the end and seeing some significant sun before I deployed shade cloth. So I will definitely file that away for the future.

[mickthecactus]

I feel really sorry for you guys. But I admire your perseverance!

[Azuleja]

Honestly this is so sad. I'm sorry for your losses. I've heard about the saguaro and other cactus species that have been toppling, and I know that affects other species as well.