A funny thing happened on the way to the Pharmacy

Yesterday at the Pharmacy, I saw an entire shelf of adorable succulents but resisted and came home with nothing. Today, my daughter and I were back and I wanted her to see all those cute plants (and secretly was thinking I might buy a couple).

The entire shelf had been replaced with New Year's hats and whistles. Bummer. I looked everywhere but no succulents. I asked the guy at the checkout - he said they were being deposited in the dumpster as we spoke. Bigger Bummer! He suggested we waylay the young lady tossing them and take them home. Awesome! We ended up with 7 trays of plants: Two trays of grafted Gymnocalycium (but we gave one tray to the young lady disposing of them); two trays of Fairy Castle cactus; one tray of grafted crested Euphorbia lactea and one tray of assorted Aloes, Haworthia, Echeveria and sedums. A few are dead and a few a rotten but, for the most part, I suddenly have a lot of plants to give away.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what to do with my new found "wealth"? I gave the second tray of Gymnos to my daughter to pass out at Church on Sunday. I am keeping the Euphorbias and my daughter took most of the Aloes, etc. home with her. That leaves about 30 Fairy Castle Cactus:

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/98378/#b

Thoughts?

Daisy

Wow!

Too fun!! You could put them on your trade list, but that's potentially slow and you might be babysitting the plants awhile. Are there any local DGers who might be jonesing for a Fairy Castle cactus? Or, are there any craft/etc. fairs coming up for the holiday season? You could distribute them there.

I hate to sell them as I got them for nothing. I would like to just give them away to people who would enjoy them.

I'm going to call my Church Pastor and see if she has any ideas.

Daisy

My local High School has a course in Horticulture, the students grow things in the greenhouse there and have a big plant sale in the spring. Maybe you should check out your local school and donate them? I donated some old photography equipment to my High School Photography Class, they were very happy about it.

You could "sell" them and donate the money to Charity.

Anybody want one? Free for the price of postage. ..

Anything left by Sunday will go to Church with a "donation" basket beside them. The donation will go to the Church.

Donating to a fundraiser sounds like a good idea. Have a little plant yard sale and then donate the proceeds to a charity.
They are really beautiful plants. They would also make great little gifts to give to neighbors and friends.

Doll the pots up with wrapping paper and bows and give to all the hard working volunteers at the church as a gift of thanks. Gift ideas to postman/woman, garbage collectors, teachers, etc...

Good going Daisy! Glad to see when good things happen to good people.

Bill

Thanks Bill. Your tray is in the mail. Scott Bar is small; I'm sure the mailman can find you. 8')

I wonder if the man in the pharmacy expected me to take them all or just a couple. I can't stand to see living things turned into landfill so took them all knowing this (what to do with them) would turn into an issue. I'm almost afraid to go back in. Its because that same day I got a phone call from the bank (I had just closed my account). Seems I'm a bank robber too; they gave me too much money and now they want it back. Bank robber and cactus thief.

I just spoke to the Pastor at my Church. She is going to go set up a table in the fellowship hall and make a sign (there's enthusiasm!). It will be interesting to see if this gets worked into a sermon as I told her the pretty ones with the orange heads are parasites sitting on the shoulders of the host plant and eventually, the host plant would die from overwork and then the orange head would die also. Plant world brutality orchestrated by man!

Daisy

Good going Daisy.
You've had some interesting experiences lately.

Ha ha! Right on both counts. So much for hiding in the woods.

Chuckles at the fake flowers. ..even though they are just not right. And I tried way to many times to keep a red gymnoor a yellow peanut going.

Sounds like you are having a fine time doing a good thing.

Bill

Yes, the straw flowers are delightful. 8') Luckily they came off the Euphorbias easily and didn't leave any "roots" behind.

My daughter started pulling them off the fairy castle cactus yesterday and I stopped her. They look more gifty with their colorful wrappers and flowers in tact.

I looked for fairy castle cactus flowers on the internet and they are all sprouting colorful straw flowers. Apparently, straw flowers might be the best you can hope for. Maybe I should send each cactus home with its own low heat glue stick.

Daisy

End of the story: We took 3 flats of cactus (almost 60) to church on Sunday. By the end of fellowship time, they were gone. It was great to see how delighted everyone was, especially the kids.

I felt like Santa Claus! Almost as good as the year I gave all my friends birthday gifts on my birthday.

Daisy