Sab Sam Boon is the new favorite

This nee adenium is soo pretty in person I don't like how the leaves look



It has that uneven marbling color, and since it is grafted, I worry that it was grafted using unclean tools. The blooms look perfect and I already hand pollinated these. No other deformities, leaves size look normal.

I've seen Sab Sam Boon from some suppliers and it's on my list and just moved up the list. Yours are all just gorgeous.

We're having some sunny days and the birds are singing in anticipation of winter's grasp relenting to the arrival of spring. Although there's still 2-3 months until any real gardening can be done here and the snow is so deep that I barely have anywhere to throw it when I'm shovelling the path from the house to the street without just causing a small avalanche, I'm reeeeeally itching to grow stuff and to repot all the Adeniums.

I seem to be doing it differently every time.

Last time, I put them in very shallow plastic pots, but didn't cut all the tap roots. As a result, several of the smallest ones are lifting themselves out of their pots at various angles.

Now I've bought 12 Ø 17 cm and 12 Ø 19 cm terracotta pots and taken in and cleaned a bunch of old terracotta pots of various sizes.

I've bought soil, ordered pumice, rice hulls and coco husk, and they should be arriving next week. I so wish I could just go get everything in one place, but noooo. A different store for each item with all the extra shipping costs. The rice hulls are from a home brewery supplier, even. But with the bulk I had to order, at least I won't have to buy it all over again next time I need to repot.

It feels like I've spent a small fortune just on pots and potting medium. The mix from the previous repotting together with more selective watering seems to have paid off quite well, though, with no deaths so far this winter (though there's one cutting that's a bit sus and might have rot).

Do you have access to one stop shopping for all your Adenium needs? Do you mix your own potting medium?

Trying to decide whether or not to repot the ones with buds and risk not getting flowers from them until later. Considering a couple of them are breaking their pots, I might have to sacrifice some potential flowers.

I'm an absolute helicopter parent to my plant babies.

I can relate to everything. I've had past winters when there was literally no place to shovel new snow and trying to toss it on top of 5' piles, but this year I've only had to shovel twice and it's been melted for awhile, so snow has been much less this year for me.

I do mix my own (I've been using deepsouth's recommended mix that works well), and I've been getting probably most of it from Amazon now. The local nurseries and even the big box stores will have some things, but they're usually more expensive for what they do have, or 50# bags only, and when it comes to the non-generic items they sell in bulk, like particular sizes of lava rocks or charcoal or even small pebbles, I can't find it locally. Even clay pots, the next size from a 6" locally was jumping to an 8", which really seemed much too big. I found true 7" clay pots on Amazon finally though, so I'll save the 8" pot for next year's repotting.

I just repotted one that I didn't think had buds yet, and as I had everything out and was doing a little pruning, I noticed there was one stem with really tiny buds. So I didn't prune that one stem, but did prune several others. That one really needed it, the roots were growing out of the bottom hole and I really tried to remove as much old potting mix as possible too. It's been about a week now and it's still in a shaded room and no water yet, but so far the buds are getting larger and don't appear to be shriveling up. So I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

And yes, I feel like it's a small fortune too, but it's for the babies! So it's a necessary evil that can't be avoided.

I'm glad I'm not alone! ^^

My big plant seems to have survived winter inside, right by a S window. Taking it out tomorrow. Supposed to be 70 & mostly sunny. I had trouble trying to water this often enough last summer so I'm going to choose a slightly less exposed spot that goes into shade earlier in the day.

This is a bad winter for me. I lost several big adeniums. I kept them mostly dry but moisture during winter probably caused the "stem" and "root rot". So sad and work is so busy I don't have time for repotting. And that is not a good news for my desert roses because several are in need of repotting.

As for repotting desert rose with buds, I am successful so long as i move it to the bigger pot without changing disturbing the roots. After blooming (assuming no seedpod develops) then you can repot the normal way.

Awww, so sorry! The struggle is real.

Sorry to hear that, Gigi. Losing older plants is always more heartbreaking to me.

These are pics of the root ball on Lady Demure when I pulled her out of the pot. I did remove as much potting mix as possible by gently poking the root ball with this aluminum stick that came with some potting mix I had ordered. It's like a chopstick but with a very rounded blunt end to it and worked very well for that. If I didn't do it now, I'd have to do it again in a few months, so figured I'd take my chances with the buds. And obviously I love using old plastic coffee containers to store left over potting mixes, it's so easy to write on the lids.


The flower buds are still getting larger, so I'm still hoping they'll make it. But it won't be the end of the world for me if they don't, this one really needed the repotting.


I wanted to raise it more, but I didn't want to lose some of the roots in front, but it now looks like it has knees showing.


And this is the new butt crack raised higher with some fat roots now showing underneath.


The only thing I'm a bit worried about is getting the potting mix inside all the roots. I tried little spades for houseplants and trying to fill in as best I could, I'm hoping when watering that some mix will settle into any holes I left so I can just top it off and it'll be ok.

I see some use a stick to poke the dirt and I actually bought a chopsticks 🥢 that I would stick to shift the dirt underneath. Looks good!

I also have those sticks, very useful during repotting, to release the dirt from the roots, and also to release the air pocket in the media. Mine are branded, like Oral-B or sensodyne, love the right one as it has angle, can reach certain difficult area, and very helpful in pushing the plant out by sticking from the bottom of the drain hole.

I did have a hard time getting it to release from the clay pot. I smacked the sides and bottom many times, tried a butter knife along the sides in just a few spots, and it finally came out. My big fear is damaging the roots. I like that curved one, that could be very useful loosening up the root ball, but I don't think I've ever had a toothbrush that curved.

Yeah, I only seen that curved one once, and I don't remember the brand, I made that first one long time ago, before covid. And I plan to make some additional curved sticks, those toothbrush with clear plastic can be bended with additional 🔥 .

Every kind of plant I've tried to repot from clay was very very firmly attached to the inside of the pot. I usually have to dig them out with a tiny shovel.

After watching too many you tube in repotting desert roses, what works for me is to make sure the media is dry when I repot. Then I use the "orchid stick" or "chopstick" to loosen the dirt on the side, just tugging it gently. Then I am bad about washing and trimming the roots and I just really loosen the dirt from the rootball (or remove the succulents roots) and expose the caudex then put more dirt underneath. I have accidentally broken some roots way too many times I don't mess with them anymore.

Now My desert roses are starting to bloom and a few seedlings too are waking up with buds! but here's what's blooming today.
Seedgrown purchased from BBS:






These are all grafted:

Gigi, the way you repotted is exactly what I do for the larger adeniums. I make sure the potting mix is dried out, and gently poke out the loose soil as much as possible. I don't worry about getting every last bit of it, I worry more about damaging the roots. And then fill it all back in with fresh dry potting mix.

This last one I'm keeping near an east window where it's in shade, never gets even the east sun hitting it, for 1-2 weeks, and no water yet. Maybe next week I'll move back to its usual south window, but I'll wait and see when I think it needs water. It had been getting watered just once a month during winter indoors.

This is like a chameleon except that it changes color even if background is the same. Normal color being marketed:

Then it fades to this color, I would have bought this separately thinking it is a new variety!



And the in between colors are different too!

That's like having a 3-in-1 plant! I'd really love a flower that changes that much.

Yes and all these 3 blooms are on the plant right now. I tried to hand pollinate this but inside is super dark color so I can't see the pollen. I just pretended the toothpick was a bee and just lifted the flower upright and twisted the toothpick gently. Not my usual way of hand pollinating but it is worth the try.