Top 5 'spikeys'

[Jim_Mercer]

The latest Amateur Gardening magazine has a few pages on "Plants of the moment: Cacti and succulents" with tips from Gynelle Leon of Prick with the "Top 5" plant for indoors being:-
Crassula ovata
Aloe variegata
Echeveria elegans
Haworthia fasciata
Echinopsis subdenudata

and 4 to try outdoors

Sempervivum
Aeonium 'Zwartkop'
Agave parryi
Sedum spathulifolium

[Paul in Essex]

Aeonium 'Zwartkop' is an excellent plant to grow outdoors. If you live southwest of Penzance, it is hardy, too!

[Jim_Mercer]

Aeonium 'Zwartkop' is an excellent plant to grow outdoors. If you live southwest of Penzance, it is hardy, too!

They do say it can be grown outdoors all year in Cornwall and parts of western Scotland but elsewhere under cover over winter - Agave parryi is outdoors summer then bring inside in autumn.

[Paul in Essex]

A strange distinction to make, then. You could probably keep 99% of succulent plants outside if it is only for the summer.

[Brian]

Not a very adventurous list. Other cacti & succulents certainly available!

[Patrick]

Aeonium 'Zwartkop' is an excellent plant to grow outdoors. If you live southwest of Penzance, it is hardy, too!

Well I can't grow it outside here in southern Portugal, I managed to save a few from last winter but most were turned to mush

[daniel82]

Not my personal 5 top ones and the distinct lack of actual spikey cacti is dissappointing.

[MikeT]

"Top 5 Spikeys" "best succulents and cacti for indoors". As 'cacti' is plural, it's a shame to see only one, and that's spineless. 2 genuinely hardy out of 4 for outdoors. Makes you wonder if all the advice about roses and strawberries is of equal quality.

[Stuart]

For a magazine sold to the general public, it was probably best to stick to fairly dull plants that are grown in Holland in huge numbers and fairly easy to find at garden centres, DIY shops etc in the UK. Hopefully the info was correct but I don't expect the BCSS got a mention!

Stuart

[Apicra]

It is a shame that the BCSS does not produce a top-ten list, since that is the format that journalists need. The RHS identify 278 in their list of AGM c&s plants:
http://apps.rhs.org.uk/agm/award.asp?tx ... dio=G&%23=

Best wishes,
Derek Tribble