Encore
We recently launched Philstar.com’s new website last month with new and exciting capabilities, enhanced interactiveness (if there is such a word) and great new features. So far, we’ve been getting rave reviews from all over the world. Even past critics have contacted us to let us know that we’re finally getting things right, in their view. And one clear indicator of our progress is our daily page view count, which has increased by several hundred thousand per day already. To all those who have in one way or another helped us via their contributions in improving our site, a massive “thank you” to you! And to those who haven’t visited Philstar.com yet, why don’t you check us out and let us know what you think, too?
One of the features that we have significantly improved is our Archives section, where you will be able to access content from The Philippine STAR dating back to the year 2000. Hopefully soon, we will be able to extend that content search all the way back to our paper’s inception in 1986. Anyway, I was playing around with our archives recently and decided to do a check on the Succulentophile column. Now, a few months ago, I said that I had been writing this column for about five years now. But checking via Philstar.com’s archives, I see that I actually wrote my first column, entitled “Getting Hooked,” on Sept. 21, 2002, over six years ago! And we’ve published 105 articles of Succulentophile so far during this period. I am still amazed (and maybe all of you are, too) that this column is still chugging along after all these years. Many thanks again for your continued readership and support!
Over the last month, I’ve gotten some nice commentary back on the last few issues, which essentially featured cacti and succulents at their best, which is when these are in flower. Flowering is also a good sign that your plants are healthy. One of these instances was back on Nov. 14, during Ateneo Batch 1983’s 25th silver anniversary celebration held at the Urdaneta Village Town Hall. It was really great seeing my old classmates and batchmates. Over 120 of us showed up for the event, which I am told was a great turnout. If I recall correctly, this was just the second school reunion I ever attended (my previous one was for Xavier School, but that was many years ago). My, how time flies! And life on earth is really short; we really have to make the most of our time here.
I was quite pleased to have several classmates come up to me and actually tell me they read and enjoyed my column. Some are real plant lovers themselves, like Gina Francisco and Mike Caluag. Others were just curious to see what I was up to after all these years.
On another occasion, I was in Sta. Elena on a Saturday to have lunch with my family. While there, I bumped into my old friend Freddie Antonio, who was the former CEO of Grepalife, among other accomplishments in his illustrious career. Freddie was having lunch with his threesome before teeing off. His playing partners included another acquaintance, Nonoy Quimpo. Nonoy’s wife, Myla, is a close friend of my wife, Rose Anne. And Nonoy’s brother Joey also went to the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, just like me. The third in their flight was Secretary Romulo Neri, now administrator of the Social Security System in the country. Secretary Neri is also an ardent plant lover with a focus on orchids and African violets, if I remember correctly. I met Secretary Neri at a dinner hosted by Jimmy Gonzalez at Le Soufflé a few months back. Anyway, to cut a long story short, Secretary Neri had read my column that morning and commented on the beautiful flowers of the cactus world. He never thought that cactus blooms could be so pretty — among the prettiest in the plant world. Of course, I totally agree with him.
So as an encore to the last couple of articles, I wanted to show a few more succulents in bloom, including two rare (in the tropics) Conophytums from South Africa, which I have managed to grow for about a year now, and which recently flowered for me. As previously mentioned, I am slowly “experimenting” with Conophytums and Lithops again after a disastrous foray several years back where I ended up killing all of my living pebbles. These plants are among the most temperamental and difficult of all succulents to cultivate here in the tropics (they’re a lot easier to grow in temperate climates). I’m experimenting with them slowly, but so far so good. If all goes well, I should be writing about my hoped-for successes with these beauties some time next year.
Finally, you may have noticed that I have two plant photos here of succulents that aren’t in flower. The first is Haworthia luri. I just thought I would show a photo of this highly beautiful South African with its translucent windows on its leaves outlined with beautiful mustard-colored cryptic lines. The second is Yavia cryptocarpa, one of the rarest cacti in the world found at an elevation of 3,700 meters above sea level in Northern Argentina, close to the Bolivian border. It is the only species of this newly discovered genus. The genus is named after Argentina’s department Yavi, Jujuy province, where this plant is endemic to sparsely vegetated rocky slopes. This plant is a cryptocarp, which means that the fruits are formed inside the plant’s body, thus being only visible when the plant shrinks in the drought period. I plan to do a more extensive feature on interesting South American cacti in the future. Yavia is a prelude to this.
