More Inter-City Show 2016

 Above:  this trophy winning Tephrocactus geometricus has been winning at shows since at least 2011--if you google image on 'Tephrocactus geometricus', numerous photos of this specimen appear, growing steadily larger and ever more impressive.

Below:  Best Dyckia, 'Tina Wallace':

Best...something.  Astrophytum?  Gorgeous.
 Another Trophy Table gem, (Best Euphorbia?) was this flawlessly grown Euphorbia abdelkuri, native to no where on earth except one small island off the coast of Yemen.  In person, close up, it looked like it was cast from concrete.  
A huge Euphorbia bupleurifolia.  No trophy or ribbon, but impressive nonetheless.
I have no clue, and no comment:

A Gibbaeum.  I could not figure out the container--is it some sort of old scrub brush?  Nifty, what ever it is. 
The Gibbaeum group:
A Haworthia collection:
 I dunno, but it's cool:
 Lithops:
 
Aluaudia dumosa.  It grows no leaves, rather it photosynthesizes with its branches:
A very silvery selection of Andromischus alstonii 

An Astrophytum, perhaps A. asterias 'Super Kabuto'.  Originally native to the Rio Grande valley of Texas and some areas of northern Mexico,  Astrophytum is sadly now very rare in the wild due to habitat loss, invasive plants, and poaching, though the genus is thriving in little pots in many fancier's collections. 

A Beaucarnea recurvata base rotted and seemingly dead, but sprouting new growth. 



Sesamothamnus lugardii on the left.  Endemic to southern Namibia, eastern Botswana, southern Zimbabwe, and parts of the Transvaal of South Africa.

The trophy table:
Pot whimsy



Mammillaria plumosa.  The pot was wisely chosen, because the grey makes the white of the plant whiter.  A white pot would have made the plant look greyer. 
 Opuntia of some sort, simply staged and beautifully grown.   
We came home with a couple of new pots and a new Echinopsis denudatum 'Fuzzy Navel".  
 The fuzzy bits:
 A pot handmade by Mark Muradian.  The plant is Echeveria 'Red Knight', bought a few weeks ago at a local nursery.
How could I resist paw prints? 




A faux-bois style pot by Peety Pots.
 
It is the new home for a little Agave:
  So, that was the show, a show of strange and wonderful things.  

Comments

  1. At each photo I thought "cool and weird!", and then I saw the Sesamothamnus lugardii and I think I might have to find one. Love it! Really like the last pot you bought!

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    1. It's beautifully made, the pot. Photo doesn't do it justice.

      S. lugardii seeds are out there! :)

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  2. I HAD to google Tephracactus geometricus to make sure it was a real plant. It looks like golf balls glued together. Thanks for highlighting so many strange and wonderful things. I enjoyed it immensely. Your own purchases were good ones too. I like my succulents, but none are really odd. Well, I do have one Euphorbia obesa, but it's not that odd.

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  3. Strange and wonderful indeed. I can't imagine the stress some of those cactus owners must feel when it comes time to repot their treasures.

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    1. I would think with the Tephrocactus the owner would need several extra hands to help. It's getting quite big.

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  4. Fantastic plants all around. I can't imagine the caliber could be any higher elsewhere.

    The nest-like pot for the Gibbaeum is actually clay. Keith Taylor makes pots like that, using a garlic press to extrude the clay.

    I talked to Mark Muradian for quite a while at the Sacramento C&S show in May, and he said that cat- and dog-themed pots sell very well for him :-).

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    1. Thanks for the info on the mop head pot. It was so cool (as was the plant). It must also be difficult to fire it correctly. A skilled potter! MM had several more pots that were even more fabulous, but I was trying not to over do the purchasing.

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  5. So many wonders! I have to wonder if that Dyckia 'Tina Wallace' was the same one featured at the bromeliad show in Torrance. I'm glad to see that Mark Muradian is still making those paw print pots - next time I see one I'll scoop it up on sight rather than scoping out the show first. I love the faux-bois pot too.

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  6. My reaction to the first one was that it was completely unreal, and as I scrolled down, I realized that they pretty much all were! Plants truly are wondrous! Thank you for a very interesting post that gave my sense of awe a boost.

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    1. The concrete Euphorbia was truly a wonder to behold. Along with a lot of others.

      A sense of awe is something we should hold on to. It gives perspective. The stars in the sky are quick and easy for that--something light pollution is eliminating. We must find awe where we can.

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  7. Right on with the "awe" thing. It's hard to imagine that all of these are part of the everyday landscape in some part of the world...well, except for the one that is sadly going extinct in the wild.

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    1. We're ruining things that took millions of years to create. :(

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  8. I almost bought that Muradian pot on Friday.

    You appear to go to this show a lot. My first. How did it compare to years past? I had a few people tell me it was a great show.

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    1. I have a couple of other Muradian pots. He's very talented.

      I've been to about five Inter-City Shows in the past six or seven years. We skipped one year because the temperature was 112F--too hot! It seemed to be slightly smaller than in years past (but not by much), but the quality is always very, very high. The sales seem busier than they used to be due to the increased popularity of succulent plants.

      It would be great to go on Friday but the traffic--it would take hours to get home.

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  9. Is there an online shop where I can purchase Mark Muradian pots?

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    1. M, he is on Facebook, so you could ask him about that directly.

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