Huernia schneideriana Plant Care

The ID had been such a mystery to me. 

Almost mind boggling until I came to an understanding that regardless whether it's Stapelia, Huernia, Hoodia, Orbea, or many other names but basically it's just the same parent plant been interchanged and interbred until they are no longer one singular plant.

On the basic side for identification - Stapelia have larger flowers than Huernia.

My closest guess is that this one is Huernia schneideriana.

This one seemed to cascade freely without having erected type behavior and I really love this one as it really have that cascading medusa hair kind-of effect that I'm looking for my theme garden.

The off-shoot stem are quite fragile and so do take care not to knock them off but if they do drop off - the pieces can be propagated back using cactus/succulent medium - it need to be fast draining and hold moisture as the same time. Too much water can rot them and so do watch on the watering.

This one can grow in shade but may require more on the sunny side. You can also trim portions of the one long stem into many pieces but allow it to totally dry off the wound before replanting to avoid stem rotting.

The don't have pest but do keep check on mealybug or scale insects as these are farmed by ants - the real culprit. 

Another thing about anchoring - the roots are not usually deep and they can easily rip off and fall away if they get bottom heavy with other plantlets growing as support on them. The best is to carefully remove them once they are long and mature and allow the tip bottom to dry off for 3-4 days before propagating them into a fast draining media.

Do take serious when any root rot or stem rot appear as it can cause the whole plant to be infected and rot away. Cut with a clean sterile scissors and also let the cut wound part to fully heal before replanting which may take few weeks.

As for fertilizing - I would use foliar fertilizer for orchids. It seemed to so well and they bloom beautifully along the stem-line. I will post the picture in my next post after this on the flowers alone.

Other than that. this is a fairly an easy plant to care and cultivate. 

I would consider a hardy succulent plant to grow.

Basic Care & Maintenance of Huernia species

Medium:
This require a fast draining medium - something like orchid medium mix.
It does well with a mixture of perlite, sphagnum moss, cocopeat & bark mix.
Similar for cactus and succulent mix.

It should not be a strong drainage mix where it doesn't hold any moisture at all but it should not be holding water too where the roots and stem can rot too. The balance of both is ideal.

Sometimes the nursery plant them in cocopeat only and when it ages - the root rot takes place and the whole thing succumb - new propagation is required to keep the species going or else it will just matures and dies.

And so - I would recommend to reset the medium more with balance mix rather than just one medium (cocopeat)

Watering:
I water daily and twice during the hot dry days. These can go without water for few days to a week. 

Overwatering can cause stem rot which often occurs at root end. I notice the fallen piece with a rot at the base. Do take a cut a slight distance from the rot and let the wound to heal for a week before replanting it again.

Sun:

This require bright shade areas - too hot bright sun may cause this one to turned slightly burn red.

I believe it is ideal to grow both bright shade and direct sunny areas.

This particular one grows in a cascading formation rather than growing upward like their other counterparts - so do take note of the bottom heavy if in case more new shoots start to appear and their space to grow downward.

Other Factors:

1) Do take effort to foliar fertilizer on them to induce new growth or else it will remain in that same size for months.

2) It's a trailing cascading plant - so do allow space for it to grow and cascade.