Description
Lithops julii is a very pretty species conspicuously pale, usually pearl- to pink-grey leaves but very variable in colour, with characteristic “lip-smears” which is a distinctive feature of this species. The lip-smear occurs occasionally as a narrow edging or lining all along the outer margins. Three main forms have been proposed and were even given varietal status (“pallid”, “reticulated” and “fuscous”) but wild populations tend to have at least two and many have all three of this forms variously intermingled.
Habit: Lithops julii is a stemless small to medium sized species that grows solitary or forming clumps of 2 or up to 15 or more) bodies.
Body (paired leaves): Cone-shaped, truncate, separated by a 5-10 mm deep fissure with (usually) conjunct lobes. Face slightly reniform flat or slightly convex; sides coloured pate to very pate (bordering on slightly yellowish-white); in the young stage rugulose, the islands irregular in shape, coloured same as sides; the depressions of a dark yellowish-brown colouration forming a fairly broad network, in the depressions isolated dark red dots and very short prominent, broad dark-red tines, sometimes all the tines interconnected with one another, thereby giving the whole depression a deeper tint; in the older stage the islands are fewer, due to the depressions flowing into one another and forming a fairly large window of a much tighter colour, with here and there the remains of a dot or tine; these entirely absent afterwards, giving the whole a much tighter colour and the appearance of a different plant; the islands verging on white and the depressions a pate grey-green colour; in the later stage the outer margin with teeth of irregular shape and size; inner margins straight; in the very old leaves blue-green dots. This species is very variable some specimens being opaque whitish-grey and almost uniform in colour, others opaque but strongly reticulated with fine impressed brown markings, yet others with largely open obscurely translucent windows.
Flowers: Single, white, daisy-like, about 3 cm in diameter, emerging from the fissure and as large as the pair of fleshy leaves below.
Blooming season: From mid-summer through fall.
Fruit: Seed capsules mostly 6-loculed, top more or less flat, faces elliptic.
Seeds: Yellow-brown to light yellow-brown.
Origin and Habitat
50 km SE of Warmbad, Namibia.
Cultivation and Propagation
Easy to grow it tolerates a degree more excess water than some particular hydrophobic species, even so it must have a very open mineral, fast draining mix with little compost and a high degree of grit, coarse sand, small lava gravel or pebbles. Give them the maximum amount of light you are able to give them, but care should be taken about exposing them to the full blast of the sun rays in summer. Such tiny plants can easily get scorched or broiled and their appearance spoiled (this may not matter in the wild, where the Lithops have probably shrunk into the ground and becomes covered with sands).
Basic cultivation routine: Stop watering after flowering. Start watering after the old leaves completely dry. (Usually late March or Early April) Water freely during the growing season, soak the compost fully but allow it to dry out between waterings, no water when cold. Some growers fertilize frequently, some hardly ever. Keep them dry during the winter. Nearly all problems occur as a result of overwatering and poor ventilation especially when weather conditions are dull and cool or very humid. If too much water is supplied the plants will grow out of character, bloat, split and rot. Keep them in small pots as solitary clumps or as colonies in large, shallow terracotta seed pans.
Notes
After flowering in the autumn and extending through winter season the plant doesn’t need watering, but they will still be growing, the new bodies will be increasing in size extracting water from the outer succulent leaves, allowing them to shrivel away. In fact the plant in this time extracts water and nutrient stored in the outer succulent leaves, allowing them to dehydrate relocating the water to the rest of the plant and to the new leaves that form during this period until the old leaves are reduced to nothing more than “thin papery shells”.
Bibliography
Major refences and further lectures
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Heidrun E. K. Hartmann “Aizoaceae F – Z” Springer 2002
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Achim Hecktheuer “Mesembs, mehr als nur Lithops” Books on Demand GmbH Norderstedt. 2008
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Desmond T. Cole & Naureen A. Cole, Uwe Beyer, Yves Delange “Les Lithops” SUCCULENTES Spécial 2008 AIAPS (now Terra seca). 2008
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Desmond T. Cole & Naureen A. Cole “LITHOPS Flowering Stones” Cactus & Co. Libri. 2005
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Yasuhiko Shimada “The Genus Lithops” Dobun Shoin. 2001
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Rudolf Heine “Lithops - Lebende Steine” Neumann Verlag. 1986
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Bernd Schlösser “Lithops – Lebende Steine” Praktische Anleitung für die Zimmerkultur. BussinessPoint MEDIA. 2000
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Steven A. Hammer “Lithops – Treasures of the veld” British Cactus and Succulent Society. 1999
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Desmond T. Cole “Lithops – Flowering Stones” Acorn Books 1988
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Rudolf Heine “Lithops – lebende Steine” Neumann Verlag. 1986
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David L. Sprechman “Lithops” Associated University Presses, Inc. 1970
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Gert Cornelius Nel “Lithops” Hortors Limited, South Africa 1946
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Edgar Lamb “The illustrated reference on cacti and other succulents” Blandford Press. 1978
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Christopher Brickell, Royal Horticultural Society “RHS A-Z Encyclopedia of Garden Plants: K-Z., Volume 2” Kindersley, 2008
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G. C . Nel “Lithops: Plantae succulantae, rarissimae, in terra obscuratae, e famailia Aizoaceae, ex Africa australi” Hortors Limited, Cape Town, South Africa 1946
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Heidrun E. K. Hartmann “Illustrated Handbook of Succulent Plants: Aizoaceae F-Z” Springer, 2002
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Steven A. Hammer “Lithops: Joyaux du veld” Editions Quae, 25/nov/2010
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