BCSS - Forum

I know that Echeveria cante is not rare but it is stunningly beautiful. As mine has just started to bloom I thought that I would start a tread off for it.............
Echeveria cante by longk48, on Flickr

Echeveria cante by longk48, on Flickr

The whole plant with my size 9 in there for scale.............
Echeveria cante by longk48, on Flickr

You have a stunning plant there, Keith, it's one of my favourites, and not easy to keep in pristine condition. Well done!

One of my favourite echeverias, too, but you have to keep fingers off the leaves.

A beautiful plant. Do you give it any special treatment in winter? I struggle to get cante through the winter. By the end of winter it looks a bit unhappy and instead of picking up it gives up once the weather gets warmer. It dries up rather than rots. Does it need more than just frost protection? Or some water in winter? It's such a beauty, I'm bound to try again if I see one for sale - despite previous experience.

I have a couple of Echeveria cante and would echo all the comments here about its beauty and the stunning nature of the flowers. I also have Echeveria 'Domingo' and Echeveria 'Afterglow', both hybrids of E cante. They both have flowers with a marked similarity to E cante and I am fortunate that both have flowered for me. E 'Afterglow' flowered last year and seems to have clumped up in an amazing fashion.
Echeveria 'Domingo' flowers profusely every year and every year seems to outdo itself.

I have also come across a comment, here, that Echeveria cante is a tough little plant; not in the UK it is not. I find it tricky over winter, and put it in my enclosed porch and don't water it. It shrinks a lot but comes back to life once spring arrives and I start to water it, gently at first, as with most things. After that it needs plenty of water and looks awful if it dries out too much.
For some reason Echeveria 'Afterglow' is here twice. I only put it on once, so don't know how it got there.

(edit - Tony R removed duplicate picture)

I would also add, that one E cante was bought as a normal plant and one as a Tissue Culture plant, the first is fine but the latter, always seems to have brownish marks on it and at times is a very odd shape. I lost a Tissue Culture one once and have come to the conclusion that they are not reliably strong plants.

Liz M wrote: I also have Echeveria 'Domingo' and Echeveria 'Afterglow', both hybrids of E cante.

The Schulz/Kapitany book Echeveria cultivars describes both of these as E. subrigida hybrids - though does say (page 46) "We believe that this species [E. cante] was used in nearly all cases where E. subrigida is cited as parent." 'Domingo' flowers do look much more like cante flowers than subrigida flowers, judging by photos of these two species.

I find 'Domingo' straightforward to grow, unlike E. cante. The flower stalk leaves on 'Domingo' root easily to propagate new plants, which is said not to be the case with E. cante (I've never kept cante alive long enough to see it flower).

Thank you all for your comments

It lives in an unheated greenhouse all year. In the winter I have a very large tupperware tub where it goes when it gets arctic, maybe with bubble wrap over it as well as I did during the 'beast from the east'. As said by another poster, I gradually introduce water from the bottom in the spring and this year I spoilt it with a repot (so I need a biiger tube for the winter, maybe an old fishtank?). The biggest risk to the foliage bloom (is there a better/more accurate word or phrase for it?) comes from slugs and condensation drips. Basically, I find it tougher than E.purposorum which I can only overwinter in my enclosed porch.

It's probably a bit late in the season for them to come to anything but there are two new flower spikes emerging............

Echeveria subrigida.
Easy to grow, flowers almost continuously and one of the few plants my wife will let me have in the house.