# Adenium obesum



## John M (Feb 17, 2011)

This survived the freeze 3 years ago and it took a long time to recover. But, finally, it's looking good again.


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## JeanLux (Feb 17, 2011)

Wow that's a cool plant I did not know yet!!!! Bonsai-like!!! Jean


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## Shiva (Feb 17, 2011)

Super flowering on this one. Vibrant colours.


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## Wendelin (Feb 17, 2011)

That is a very, very beautiful plant! :drool:


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## Yoyo_Jo (Feb 17, 2011)

How lovely! I've never heard of this one.


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## Ernie (Feb 17, 2011)

Hey, where's the lip???  

Pretty thing.


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## paphioboy (Feb 17, 2011)

Very nice 'foo kwei hua' (as we call it here).  Its currently a big craze in Malaysia... You can get all sorts of flowers.. single/double petals, red/pink/white flowers in various combinations.. I didn't know it can tolerate frosts, particularly since it is a desert succulent... Definitely proved how tough plants can be..


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## paphioboy (Feb 17, 2011)

http://www.2m-adenium.com/adenium/index.php

http://www.desertroseking.com/

Happy shopping!


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## NYEric (Feb 17, 2011)

Ernie said:


> Hey, where's the lip???
> 
> Pretty thing.



:rollhappy:

Interesting. thanx for sharing.


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## nikv (Feb 17, 2011)

How do you grow yours and what do you use for a potting medium? I've tried to grow these several times and they have all rotted on me. I'm guessing sandy soil and infrequent watering maybe?


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## etex (Feb 17, 2011)

Super blooms and plant. Great growing!
It's got a substantial trunk. Do you have to do alot of pruning to keep it compact?


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## SlipperFan (Feb 17, 2011)

I've seen picture of these in catalogues. Are they difficult to grow?


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## Brian Monk (Feb 17, 2011)

Desert Rose is a fantastic thing. All kinds of varieties. They are garden plants here, and the biggest one I have seen is 6 feet tall w/literally a hundred blooms.


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## Kavanaru (Feb 18, 2011)

Very nice one! 

My Adenium is still too small for flowering... How do you grow yours?


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## John M (Feb 18, 2011)

nikv said:


> How do you grow yours and what do you use for a potting medium? I've tried to grow these several times and they have all rotted on me. I'm guessing sandy soil and infrequent watering maybe?


I keep this on the sunny side of the greenhouse at the warm end. It goes outside in the summer into full sun. It is in promix HP with a topping of limestone screenings, in a clay pot. Yes, I do let it dry between waterings. It will look pretty rough by the fall with yellowing and spotted leaves when temps start to cool down. I defoliate it as I move it back inside and it will immediately grow these nice new replacement leaves and then bloom in mid winter. I kept it a bit too wet this winter and there was a bit of rot in some thick roots that were exposed. 

As for feeding: it gets some time release fertilizer as a top dressing in the early summer. The rest of the year, it gets the same as all my orchids....a foliar spray of weak hydroponic tomato fertilizer solution every week or two, depending on the amount of sunshine. 

I wouldn't say that they're difficult to grow; but, you do have to watch the watering to not cause root rot. Also, sometimes the foliage looks bad and thee whole thing is quite ugly....then, it blooms! I don't like that. So, I started defoliating it in the fall, prior to blooming season so that it would have all new fresh attractive foliage at blooming time.

I don't prune it much. However, it got a severe pruning by the frost conditions in my greenhouse 3 years ago. It sulked terribly after that and refused to grow until I repotted it last summer. Then, it began to pick up. I think I'll repot it annually from now on. It seemed to really like that!

Wonderful links paphoboy! I wish they exported.....and I had a MUCH bigger greenhouse!

BTW: The clay pot in the photo is 8".


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## W. Beetus (Feb 18, 2011)

Beautiful plant! One of my favorite succulents.


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## nikv (Feb 18, 2011)

Thanks for all the info, John M. Much appreciated!


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## paphioboy (Feb 18, 2011)

You might want to keep your prunings and restart them as cuttings..  They grow pretty easy (if not one of those grafted types)...


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## Marc (Feb 20, 2011)

Considering to put this plant on our south facing windowsill. Haven't found anything yet that can stand there all the time and not getting yellow leaves or something similar.


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## John M (Feb 20, 2011)

Marc, I think one of these would do quite well in a south facing window. They are a desert plant from islands in the Indian Ocean and they love sun and heat. However, the foliage is deciduous. It does get "old" looking and blemished appear. However, as I indicated earlier, when that happens, I just pull off all the leaves and force the plant to regrow new ones. That's how I got this plant to have nice flowers as well as nice leaves, all at the same time! After the leaves regrow, along with a little addition in stem length, buds are formed at the tip of each branch.


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## Hera (Feb 20, 2011)

oooooooooo that's pretty!!!!:clap:


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## cnycharles (Feb 20, 2011)

neat


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## toddybear (Feb 21, 2011)

Beautiful! I saw these in the wild in South Africa last November.


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