Summer is here again. Are growers feeling nervous?

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Images and text: Curator

Everyone says getting through summer is hard! Harder than climbing to the sky! This is easy to understand. For succulent lovers, summer is truly too cruel. Once care is not thorough enough, a large batch of succulents will perish. Whether they are spring-growing, summer-growing, or winter-growing succulents, the temperature suitable for their growth is generally between 5-35°C. The reason summer is so hard to endure is that temperatures in many regions of our country exceed 35°C. Spring has already passed, and the day before yesterday the Start of Summer passed. The high temperatures of summer are arriving wave after wave. The curator is located in Luoyang, and this week the temperature will reach as high as 35°C, let alone in the south, which is truly a tale of tears. So what aspects should be paid attention to in summer?

High-temperature environment

From the perspective of normal succulent growth, once the temperature exceeds 35°C, apart from succulents in the Cactaceae family that are relatively resistant to stress, the vast majority of succulents will enter a dormant period. The purpose is to protect themselves. In this state, you will find that the succulent leaves have become soft, and life activities also slow down.

Part of high temperature is caused by temperature, and part is caused by light. Strong light contains a large amount of ultraviolet rays. Fellow succulent owners all know that to make succulents become dazzling, ultraviolet rays are indispensable, so succulents grown outdoors are mostly extraordinarily colorful. But the intensity of ultraviolet rays must also have a limit. Once it exceeds the range that succulents can accept, at best they will be sunburned, and in severe cases they may die directly.

Now that we have recognized how terrifying the high-temperature environment is, for the sake of the succulents' lives, preventive work must be done in advance. Once you find that the temperature over the next few days will exceed around 32°C, you must prepare shading in advance.

You can buy shade cloth in advance, or at noon when it is hottest and the sunlight is strongest, temporarily block the balcony windows with cloth or newspaper to prevent succulents placed on the balcony from being sunburned. Also avoid using black or dark-colored flower pots, which cause the temperature inside the soil to rise.

Humidity environment

Besides temperature, humidity is also a powerful enemy. Temperature can at least be prevented, but humidity truly seeps in silently. If the humidity inside the pot is too high, it will directly cause root rot. If the humidity inside the pot is too high and the outside temperature rises, it is equivalent to placing the succulents damp in a large steamer, which will cause rapid death of the succulents.

The only way to prevent humidity is ventilation. In summer, for the sake of your beloved succulents, keep your electric fan running often. Especially for friends who keep succulents indoors, you can buy a timer switch online, set it to run for 20 minutes at intervals of 20 minutes. This will keep your succulents dry at all times, and your mood will be beautiful too!

Watering environment

Actually, when it comes to watering, it is closely related to temperature and humidity. Many succulent friends get confused when watering in summer, because the succulents may be in a dormant period, and it is hard to judge from their appearance whether they lack water. Let me give everyone an example. The curator has received many help letters from succulent friends. Actually, judging only from the pictures, the leaves are shrunken and soft, and all kinds of appearances suggest it should be lack of water. However, the other person told me that they had just watered a few days ago, and the succulents were properly exposed to sunlight every day. This shows that judging whether succulents lack water in summer based only on external appearance is unrealistic. Therefore, what succulent owners should do is record the watering intervals, do a good job of shading, and be sure to control water! Let the succulents get through summer smoothly.

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