Alluaudia Species, African Ocotillo, Madagascar Ocotillo

I bought as small as you can buy them at a local Home store about 5 years ago. Only a few inches. At first they were kept potted..then in...Read More ground when I saw they could take the SF bay area rains and winters. Then moved again last year. After all that,no losses and the small group is growing,in leaf now in spring.
The more sun the better and may need staking up until they can hold themselves upright.
Great plants and very different for here.

I planted several of these striking specimens last year and they did well through the hot Palm Springs summer and temperate fall. As exp...Read Moreected, they lost their leaves when cold weather hit in January, but they haven't yet leafed out. It is well into the 80's every day now (late March) and I would have thought they would have started by now. Does anyone have experience to share on this? Thank you.

Two years ago when I bought my house in Port Isabel, TX (nearly the southmost point of Texas on the Gulf of Mexico) this 10 foot plant wi...Read Moreth many branches or "arms" was in an 18 inch pot on a sun blasted patio. Since then, it's gone through two hurricanes and two serious freezes of several nights duration. The last freeze took out about a quarter of my garden, including 30 foot trees. The Alluaudia procera looked like a skeleton--grey and dry--but leafed out in the spring, even adding a few more inches to it's height. Summer temps here are reliably in the 90's with ferocious humidity. Spring and Fall there's salty, often dusty winds. I water it about once a week in the summer, and know it's got a fire ant nest in the pot. I've never fertilized it, and would love to re-pot it, but am worried about messing up a good thing even if it's in an ugly pot. Plus it would probably be painful: thorns AND ants.

I will be transplanting this plant out of the ground. The plant is ten feet tall and I would like to know if anyone knows how deep the ro...Read Moreots are at this size? I will be putting this in a pot as well.