Scottish Rebutias

[SimonT]

I'm not sure what counts as growing outside these days.
I have Rebutia/Aylostera plants outside over the summer that will get covered up over the winter.
The aim is to stop rain and snow getting to the plants.
I might put some in a coldframe- but this does the same thing as it will be unheated- just shelter from the wet weather.
Temperature in the coldframe at night just tracks the outside temperature(with a small lag).

I might try one or two plants completely outside over the winter but then I would try to position the plants so they stay dry and have some natural protection. So this is the same as being in a coldframe except they're sheltered from the worst of the weather by natural garden features?

I'm waiting to Paul's book to arrive to provide guidance and definitions!

I've also noticed that some Aylostera are much better at surviving wet and cold than others. For example, Rebutia/Aylostera muscula does not seem to like to have wet roots in the cold and soon rots. But the closely related Rebutia/Aylostera spinosissima if it gets wet plants just seems to swell in response to water but in my experience they go on to survive being cold and wet. This is just n=2 winters but I've seen consistent comments online about R/A spinnosimma. Apparently badly treated plants may not flower the following year but in my case my wet and cold plants over-wintered still flowered. Maybe they've just not been cold and wet enough yet...

[habanerocat]

R. donaldiana, krainziana, muscala, narvaecense and albiflora are the ones that came through the cold winters of 2010/11 in an unheated greenhouse for me.
Resulting in largish multiheaded plants.

But two of those rotted after an overnight stand in insecticide during the summer. They didn't like that at all.

We go again......