Giant cutting of mystery Alluaudia

15 years ago

A friend of mine, Nick, installs solar panels around Southern California. At a recent job site, he had to cut away a big branch of Alluaudia that was shading one of the panels. Being an all around good guy like this, Nick asked the home-owner if he could take it and give it to me, knowing I'm a succulent nut. Just like that I'm an owner of truly impressive stick ;-) The beast is over 4 1/2 feet tall, and is nearly 3" in diameter, excluding leaves and thorns!

I'm planning on treating it like I would any stem cutting, just with way, way more patience. Is there anything else I should know? Anyone have any experience propagating Alluaudia?

Also, any thoughts on the species? The thorn's shape and node spacing don't really look like any other Alluaudia I can find pictures of. If definately doesn't look like the A. procera I can compare it to at the Huntington Garden, even though that is still what it probably is...

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The thing is huge!

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All the thorns are sort of stunted like these, and the new season's leaves are very stubby and hard.

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The secondary leaves are super tightly packed, and thinner than what I've seen.

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Comments (3)

cactusjordi
15 years ago
Looks very much like Alluaudia ascendens to me.
Rooting takes time but will work out as you plan it.
Â¡Cuidado! I totally lost my 3 tall plants in the ground last year January due to the freeze (4 nights at about 24F) here in San Diego area.

Jordi
xerophyte NYC
15 years ago
probably ascendens...there aren't a whole lot of different Alluaudias in cultivation
joscience
Original Author
15 years ago
I thought A. ascendens had longer, sharper thorns than A. procera, not the stubby little ones on my cutting. Moreover, the thorns on A. ascendens seem to emanate directly from the stem, not a "shield" structure like this one. I'm still willing to say the weird morphology is from this plant's particular culture, but the more I look at it and other Alluaudia, the stranger it seems...

From Wikimedia commons, here is a close up of A. ascendens:
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