There we go. I'm feeling the plant move a little bit
I think we're making some progress
I'm Debra Lee Baldwin, author of three books about
succulents. This corn cob euphorbia has been crammed into this
little square pot now for five or six years
And it is time to replant it. You know give it some
TLC and display it beautifully in a one of a kind
art pot. The pot I got at a Cactus and Succulent Society
show. It's by Port Town Pottery, Regina Fernandez
It's got lines and colors in it that are just perfect for this plant
plus it's a larger size which the plant needs
but before i can do that i have to go through the plant and tidy it up
just as you would prune any plant, you look for
dead or fallen branches, and i have that here
dry eaves have gotten into the center of the plant
these are oak leaves. I love my oak trees because they create
a dappled shade for my succulents which is important
in my inland Southern California garden where it gets really hot in the summer
and we get some frost in the winter. Long handle tweezers these
are easy to get online. You can go to DebraLeeBaldwin.com
to the Tools page and i have a link to where you can get them
Now another essential tool when you're working with spiny plants:
Tongs. Just regular kitchen tongs. And what i'm going to try to do here
is to release the plant from the pot without breaking the
plant. So i want to go after the largest trunk and just see if i can scooch it
out of there without abrading the trunk too much. And no it does not
want to come out. So let's see what's going on
underneath the pot. Do you see that? Its roots have grown
out the bottom of the pot the hole is plugged
there we go
Ah! We're getting somewhere pushing in, pushing down, lifting
up with my tweezers. I'm starting to get a release of that root ball
All right so where that's branching is the crown, and I want the crown to be
just a little lower than the rim of the pot. Let's give it a good
brushing get rid of any debris that's still stuck
in there If you need to cover holes in the bottom
of a pot just take a paper towel
so that the holes are covered. I'm thinking you know maybe
25 pumice to 75 regular potting soil. Well we lost
another stem when I laid this down OK, another cutting, I want this
centered in the pot. So if you're wondering if
you've centered something stand directly over it, look down on it
Are you getting a sense of how this is working?
The color the glaze the rim color It's also the right size in terms of
scale and proportion Let's add more soil to fill that
nicely, trying not to get soil on the plant
Euphorbias are not cactus. Euphorbias are Old World plants. Very similar
conditions. Euphorbias have a milky sap, and that
makes them dangerous. This is very much a keep-away aspect of
the plant Once it roots into the soil,l it'll be
much more stable. These are rounded pebbles that have a
warm tone Oh i'm liking this!
And i think I have just enough top dressing. Yay!
Those oval pads repeat the oval stones, and over here
is a ribbed one like a saguaro that repeats the ribbing in the
euphorbia. Here's our corn cob euphorbia. It's
probably quadrupled in size since i planted it in
this pot.
I'm Debra Lee Baldwin and I wrote the book Succulent Container
Gardens as well as Designing with Succulents and
Succulents Simplified So if you want to learn more, please
check my books, they're full of great ideas
as is my website DebraLeeBaldwin.com and my YouTube channel.
Well! The tips have pinked up nicely. It's been a few months since it was repotted
and it's very happy here on my deck. It's right where we can see it when
we sit outside. These plants could be compared to feral
animals You mean well, but they don't know that.
They consider you a threat and try to bite you or keep you from
getting any closer.