OK, this is the late night, almost full moon edition of Friday Floral. Here is a flowering Crassula Portulacea, commonly called Horseshoe or Spoon Jade. Or more lately Gollum Jade and now Shrek Fingers. I’m sure it will have a new nickname when another movie comes out. Anyway, this has typical crassula-type flowers, almost exactly like my crassula ovata, or regular JadePlant.
The flowers are beautiful. They have five small petals measuring about 1/4″ inch across, with long stamens. Their color could be described as almost white with a drop of salmon pink. Some of the flowers have tiny stripe down the center in white with two drops of salmon pink. I’m going to have to get better with the macro on my camera!
I am excited to see this plant blooming. Like most of the succulents growing in my garden, this was grown from a cutting. This plant is about 5 years old and has just recently started to bloom.
The name horseshoe jade (and most others) comes from the way the leaves are rolled on the tips.
The leaves are about as thick as a pencil, but the top has a little dent in the middle.
Yes, I suppose it could look like an antenna if you are a sci-fi fan. Sometimes there is a little red tint around the leaf edges.
Actually, I think it looks like sea coral in this back view. Really, doesn’t this look like something out of the Great Barrier Reef?
Here’s a photo of a little frost damage on my crassula portulacea. The tips got tinged.
When it first happens succulents turn a dark, sickly creepy looking green right after they’ve been frozen (by all that water succulents are famous for storing). Then if the damage isn’t too deep the frozen bits become brown. I’ve also seen it show up as dots too; like freckles all over a leaf. This damage won’t go away, but it won’t get any worse either. I think this must have happened last month when we had a touch of frost.
Last year I had to brush off brown frozen bunches with a broom because I forgot to cover the plant one night. But it has recovered and seems to be fine now! I’m going to add these plant photos to my main Crassula Portulacea Page on theGardenPages…