My growing conditions

as stated in the description of my blog i live at the 63rd parallel north and the sun is visible here "for 20 hours, 19 minutes during the summer solstice and 4 hours, 43 minutes during the winter solstice". wikipedia

i live in a temperate climate, in a subarctic climate to be exact although we don't experience permafrost here. the winter temperatures are generally subzero (degrees celsius) and the summer temperatures at least over + 10 °C. however i am growing my plants indoors and the temperature is therefore at least + 20 °C all year round.

i don't know how humid it is in our apartment but during summer time my laundry takes longer to dry and the doors seem tight in their frames. during winter time the central heating keeps the indoor air very dry. e.g. the need for more moisturizing skin care products is evident during winter time.

my growing conditions affect a lot what plants i grow and what equipment i need for growing them.

Comments

May 2 to 28

i continue watering the only conophytum more often than the rest of the living stones. i am a bit scared it could die at any moment because of the transplanting and because its neighbor did die of drought. i water the conophytum plant on the 2nd (it shows clear wrinkles), the 8th, the 15th and on the 22nd of may. i just let room temperature water run through the pot. in addition i bottom water and fertilize all of the living stones on the 5th, the 12th, the 19th and on the 28th of may. i also gradually increase the amount of light my plants receive until it is about 16 h/day at the end of the month. my only conophytum on the 7th of may . the conophytum plant is residing in a 125 ml cup because it is so tiny. the cup didn't have a drainage hole originally so i needed to drill one in it. you can find several tutorials from youtube by searching for "drilling hole ceramic pot". the important part is to use a correct drill bit and to remember to use water to prevent t...

November, 1 year + 2 months

in november i was supposed to increase the dry periods between waterings. i did water and fertilize on the 5th and on the 16th of november but i forgot to water on the 27th. therfore my living stones experience a 16 day gap between the last watering in november and the first watering in december. during this month i also reduce the daylight hours to 11 hours a day. i also spray the monilaria plants once during this month as a preventative measure as they have started to grow new "bunnies". i have identified the monilaria plants as risk plants because they have a lot of crevices, drying sheets and asymmetric form in which the mites might hide in. this month i also notice that the argyroderma plant and my lithops plants have begun splitting. the conophytum plant doesn't seem to show any change but it has a couple of cracks on its surface, the remnants from overwatering.

Sowing the seeds

i watched several youtube videos before i compiled my own technique to sow the seeds. i decided not to sterilize the pumice i had bought. i don't know if sterilizing would have helped with mold or algae, the sowing conditions are anyway in favor of them (moist). apparently serious growers swear by the use of a mild fungicide. i also didn't rinse the pumice which was a mistake. it turned out to have quite a lot of dust on it. i had washed with soap some plastic containers (former food packages). i used what i had at hand and one container was black, the others see-through. all of them had original see-through lids but i needed to remove large stickers from them. unfortunately some of the glue from the stickers remained on the lids. i used about 1,2 l pumice to fill my containers about 3/4 full. i used medical swabs to cover the holes on the bottom of the containers except with the black container. i had to cut the holes myself on the black one and i made them more like s...

Growing Living Stones at 63rd Parallel North

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