Fun With 4-inch Succulents

Succulents are among our favorite plants to play with, both indoors and out. They’re great for container gardening (for small-space dwellers), sculptural and graphic (for design lovers), and drought-tolerant (for water-starved Californians). We like to plant them in crevices to spice up less attractive parts of the garden, like the rocky bed around a gas valve cover in front of our house. Photos of ours after the jump…

4-inch succulents are inexpensive and easy to plant. We nestled a few echeveria (top right corner of photo) into our makeshift retaining wall, packing loose potting soil around the roots, and planted an assortment of other babies (two sedum varieties and a “hens and chicks”) in the rocky soil around the gas main cover. We’ll probably plant a few more succulents and add some gravel “mulch” to improve drainage (and give the little garden a more unified look).

Two important things to remember with succulents: They need good drainage and a lot of light. Mix some sand or pebbles into your soil if it is especially dense or clayey. And don’t over-water; succulents can tolerate some neglect.

Indoors, they are a nice live alternative to cut flowers. You can cluster tiny succulents in a container for a centerpiece; check out this video from Sunset Magazine for full instructions. Laure posted her own amazing version on AT:LA last fall.

A few more posts from AT:LA for succulent inspiration:

Look! Really Small Succulent Garden

How To: Propagate Succulents

Succulent Terrarium

Container Garden Photo: Sunset Magazine

Comments (12)

I just killed two succulents that I kept in my living room. I probably over-watered them AND didn't give them enough light. Oh, well, I'll try again.

Yeah. I kill succulents, too.

The ones in the hallway basically died too. But the one in front of the kitchen window are flourishing.

I finally get it (after killing 3) ^O^;

I tried twice and now I have something similar as the first picture indoor and outside. The key is sun and no over watering.
I read this and so far so good for the last 6 months.
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art26055.asp

I read this article just to see if I could learn how to keep them from dying. 1/2 of the little ones I bought after Christmas already shriveled and died. The ones that went first were longer stemmed with small round leaves.

I have a succulent in a pot on my desk. It gets lots of sunlight. I run water into the pot until its full, then pour all the water out. I let the soil dry out completely, usually 1-2 weeks. Its growing really good for me.

I've killed so many plants that I've given up on having any. So far, I haven't killed my faux bamboo tree, but my cats are working on it!

I killed my succulents too -- each leaf just started withering away and then the whole thing just keeled over. :(

Yeah, you have to wait for the soil to dry out completely before you re-water them. Overwatering is what tends to kill succulents. I haven't been able to grow any plants that I like because my single apartment window is northfacing, but Im moving to a new place with southfacing windows soon I am *so* excited I can grow things now!

I got hen and chicks last summer and brought them inside for the winter and they got all ugly - grew a little sprout thing out of the top. Any ideas?

The hen and chicks get leggy indoors, that is probably the sprout thing yours has. Though some succulents flower and it could be a flower stalk it has sent up.

In Austin, we leave them outside year round and they do flower in the early spring if the winter was mild.
Succulents need more sun than water. If they've turned mushy on you before dying, they've gotten too much water and not enough drainage.
Hope that helps!
austinmodern.com

@qstar My orchids do fantastically in north-facing light :)