Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

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HaoBao
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Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by HaoBao »

Hi all, I have this one that has started to have purely white growth so I was wondering the best thing to do.

My idea was to behead it back to where some of the leaves have some chlorophyll. Then a Reddit user suggested to remove the very pale offset too, as in their experience beheaded haworthia tended to put more energy into the offsets.

Has anyone done this before?
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edds
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by edds »

Hi Paul,
As I said on Reddit, it's a case of finding out whether this form increases the chlorophyll in the leaves as each leaf matures of whether what you get at the start is what it stays like.

It seems a bit suspicious to me that both the offset at the bottom and the new growth at the top are really pale. If it was a normal reversion/total loss of photosynthetic growth it's be really bad luck for it to happen at the same time in two places on the plant!

Does anyone else on here grow it and do theirs do the same?
Ed

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HaoBao
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by HaoBao »

There are two offsets, the large one and a tiny one underneath, both very pale.

To be honest I don’t think they are going to develop any green on the white parts. Doesn’t mean they won’t as I’m not very experienced but I’ve never seen or heard of it. I was hoping the offsets would have some colour to them but they don’t. I have watered it yesterday so it may be time for a chop chop tomorrow maybe once it fills out a bit.

I do have a Haworthia Milky Way that had a red line develop but the was from a blurry pink/red area seen on an old group photo. If the photo’s upload the correct way the blurry red area is on the bottom left plant of the nine. It then went on to develop the red line on the other photo.
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All my plants are kept indoors and I started collecting in August 2018. Favourites are Pachyphytum, Echeveria, Haworthia, Mesembs and oddball Cacti.
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by esp »

If you were feeling brave / reckless, you could either core it or make vertical cuts to split the head into 2 or more sections (without actually totally separating any part from the roots), to force more offsetting.
I do suspect drastic action may be needed.
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by HaoBao »

I recklessly chopped the top off using some floss and removed the two very pale offsets so we will see. If I don’t update the thread in a month or two then it means I killed another plant. Another favourite too.

I wasn’t brave enough to chop it vertically!
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All my plants are kept indoors and I started collecting in August 2018. Favourites are Pachyphytum, Echeveria, Haworthia, Mesembs and oddball Cacti.
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MatDz
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by MatDz »

Good luck and please report back, even if just to say goodbye to the plant, it's a very interesting thread! Do you have any photos from after the procedure?
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by HaoBao »

This is how it is now. The stem on the original plant didn’t look the best to be honest, wasn’t completely white. The roots looked fine though. I put some cinnamon on the cut as I heard that was good as a natural fungicide (Don’t know if it’s true though) the offsets and a couple of leaves that came off I put in a pot just to see if anything happens.
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All my plants are kept indoors and I started collecting in August 2018. Favourites are Pachyphytum, Echeveria, Haworthia, Mesembs and oddball Cacti.
edds
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by edds »

Very brave! And neatly done. Fingers crossed it works as planned.
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by MatDz »

Thanks, fingers crossed! The loose leaf and one of the offshoots seem to have some chlorophyll (the pup much less, but maybe it's enough). Hopefully the bottom will shoot new offshoots from the greener side!
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Re: Variegated Haworthia Obtusa Marin - Behead or not?

Post by HaoBao »

Thanks, and I hope it’s ok too, always scary to behead a plant. The floss method works well when the leaves don’t have gaps to get in there with a knife. Just hope it doesn’t have any rot in the stem
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All my plants are kept indoors and I started collecting in August 2018. Favourites are Pachyphytum, Echeveria, Haworthia, Mesembs and oddball Cacti.
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