What happened here

[JonNo]

Plus one here. A couple of weeks ago mine was looking absolutely fine. Then one day one of the segments started to go brown low down. Two days later, the two adjacent segments went the same way, and after a week those three segments were brown to the top. I inspected the plant just before consigning it to the bin and the remaining segments and the roots appeared OK. Strange and sad, it was one of my favourites. Glad to know it wasn't just mine...

[Tony R]

See Ali Baba's thread today for an example of this species growing well. Nicely pot bound.
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=171433
I last grew some from seed more than 10 years ago - I remenber keeping 9 seedlings rather than the usual two or three. One by one, year by year, they passed away just like the ones above.

[Diane]

I lost one last week, too. Started going brown on one side, unpotted it, and it was quite rotten. They can be a bit temperamental, so it’s no real surprise unfortunately.

[Herts Mike]

How strange. My 40 year old asterias has also gone to the big greenhouse in the sky,

[ralphrmartin]

Watch out, watch out, the asterias reaper is about...

I lost a super kabuto V snow form, too. Fortunately, the others seem OK so far.

[Ali Baba]

I have experienced the slow disappearance of young asterias seedlings on various attempts to grow them in the past. The large plant I have is 16 years old and no trouble thankfully. I am naturally stingy with water and slow to repot though. My last batch of seed came from Mesa a few years ago and strangely they are doing fine so far...

[Apicra]

Isn't the answer here in the photo? It looks to me as if the rot entered the plant body via that dead flower? It should have been removed last October. as I must do each year for Adromischus flower spikes.

Best wishes,
Derek Tribble

[Stuart]

I tend to feel that any rot, usually forming from the roots and slowly spreading through the plant, occurring during the colder months, tends to stay hidden until the greenhouse warms up and then rapidly spreads in the heat and then it's too late to save it. With the plant in the photo, Derek is probably right and the rot started through a late-season flower. With Adromischus, I tend to remove the flower spikes when I see them as they spoil the look of the plant.

Stuart

[gerald]

Isn't the answer here in the photo? It looks to me as if the rot entered the plant body via that dead flower?

We will never know for sure but it is possible, I removed the other dead flowers but for some reason left that one on there! I will be more thorough in future, with all dead flowers (in fact I will go out and get rid of what I can find right now)

[Tina]

Could this be a more cold sensitive cultivar, I have checked mine & its on its way out too.
Seems odd that they are all dying this year I have had mine 4 years