Cycad cones and flushes

[Tracy]

2 hours ago, TropicsEnjoyer said:

Are there any indicators besides the center that a cone is coming on a sago soon? I heard somewhere that as the leaflets become more recurved it signals closer to maturity and coning, but is there any truth to this? I’m just wondering how big and thick my sago will have to be before it cones. 

I have never heard that before, and don't think there are any reliable ways to determine if  a flush will turn into a cone on a Cycad, until the cone actually emerges.

2 hours ago, Palmzilla said:

Arenarius x latifrons log jam 

Braden, you will have to reload a photo, as the earlier one didn't come through for Steve or me.  I'm curious now if these are little seedlings from one of your recent efforts with E arenarius x latifrons?  I'm keeping an eye on the triplet cones and will let you know when they start falling apart.  I'm just letting them marinate on the plant for now.

[Palmzilla]

Hi Steve hope you doing good, for some reason every time I try to post a pic it just comes out all black not sure why . 

[Urban Rainforest]

Hi Braden, Alls good here hope all is good with you and your fam! So I no longer have a computer and havent posted in like 14 years. I thought it might be difficult to post on my I phone but it might actually be easier. Try hitting add files then tap photos and then it will take you to your photo library. Give it a try. It should work for you👍

[Billeb]

On 6/25/2025 at 12:01 PM, Palmzilla said:

Hi Steve hope you doing good, for some reason every time I try to post a pic it just comes out all black not sure why . 

Braden, this happened to me a year ago or so and I don’t know why. I believe it has something to do with the size of the picture but I’m not certain. 
If I was to crop the original picture slightly and then attempt to load it again, it worked every time. Super weird. Pretty sure I went into the settings and adjusted the size of the pics the camera was taking. 
Give it a try. 
 

-dale 

[Urban Rainforest]

Speaking of hybrids I picked up 4 differant Woodii hybrids 2 years ago and the are all flushing right now. This one is Arenarius Woodii x Arenarius Woodii.

[Urban Rainforest]

Fat Arenarius x Arenarius Woodii

[Urban Rainforest]

3 minutes ago, Urban Rainforest said:

Fat Arenarius x Arenarius Woodii

Got em mixed up! This one is Natalensis Woodii x Arenarius woodii

[Urban Rainforest]

This one is fat Arenarius x Arenarius Woodii

[Urban Rainforest]

This one is Horridus Woodii x Arenarius Woodii. AKA Bride of frankenstein. I really see the Horridus starting to come through on this one. A little blue in it a very recurved leaf!

[Brian]

We have been getting quite a bit of rain in June which the plants really love. It’s a good relief from the high alkaline irrigation water that they get for most of the year. The only down side of the rains are they can burn a new flush once the sun breaks though after being wet for an extended period of time and new flushes can be devoured by the insects that hatch from the rains. 
Some of the new flushes around the garden.

 

[Silas_Sancona]

1 hour ago, Brian said:

We have been getting quite a bit of rain in June which the plants really love. It’s a good relief from the high alkaline irrigation water that they get for most of the year. The only down side of the rains are they can burn a new flush once the sun breaks though after being wet for an extended period of time and new flushes can be devoured by the insects that hatch from the rains. 
Some of the new flushes around the garden.

 

It looked like the rains have been good -so far at least- down there.. Nice to hear confirmation of that  ...and see some green on the hillsides behind you < in one of the shots >. 

[Brian]

21 minutes ago, Silas_Sancona said:

It looked like the rains have been good -so far at least- down there.. Nice to hear confirmation of that  ...and see some green on the hillsides behind you < in one of the shots >. 

We have had high amounts of rain spread over 4 tropical storms so far and another (95E) is forecast to bring more rain next week. It’s been a good start to the rainy season. When TS Erick hit I put a 5 gallon bucket in the middle of the driveway to see how much rain we would get. The next morning it had 9 inches of water. 
I’m not sure how accurate a measurement that is but I was surprised to see it.

 

[Silas_Sancona]

3 minutes ago, Brian said:

We have had high amounts of rain spread over 4 tropical storms so far and another (95E) is forecast to bring more rain next week. It’s been a good start to the rainy season. When TS Erick hit I put a 5 gallon bucket in the middle of the driveway to see how much rain we would get. The next morning it had 9 inches of water. 
I’m not sure how accurate a measurement that is but I was surprised to see it.

 

Nice..  We're expected to start getting -something- starting next week.. Hopefully, lol ..Some of the forecasts keep trying push rain chances deeper into July..    That same disturbance off the coast down there may help kick things off up here if it ends up closer to Cabo rather than veering west before it reaches Baja next week. 

5 gal bucket, or your standard, skinny rain gauge ..Subjective i suppose but, as far as i'm concerned,  ..9" is 9".  Seems it would take longer to accumulate that 9",  in a bucket than a much smaller tube, so,  seeing ..even 2 or 3 inches in the bottom of a bucket hints at everything getting a good soaking.

Yard definitely looks happy..

[Urban Rainforest]

Brian your plants and garden look lush and amazing! Your 9” in the bucket is twice what we got for the year in this so cal coastal desert! We need a good rainstorm.

[Urban Rainforest]

One of my favorite Cycads is the true blue Arenarius. Most of mine are throwing now. Heres just a few.

[Urban Rainforest]

Here is my biggest caudex one but not the best leaf form.

[Urban Rainforest]

Good ol Horridus throwing👍

[Urban Rainforest]

Nice Munchii flush.

[Urban Rainforest]

Lepidozamia Perofskyana

[Urban Rainforest]

This is my favorite Cycad I have Encephalartos Latifrons Trappes valley! Nice flush from last year. Its bout to flush again. I bought it as a 1 leaf seedling and it now has an 11” caudex! It has not been slow and has flushed every year for me.

[Billeb]

4 hours ago, Urban Rainforest said:

……I bought it as a 1 leaf seedling and it now has an 11” caudex! It has not been slow and has flushed every year for me.

Steve, about how many years ago did you acquire the Latifrons? I agree by the way, I don’t find Latifrons as slow as others have stated previously. Even my small plant has flushed twice a year for the last few. They are awesome plants and yours looks great. Needs to be grounded!! 🤣🤣
 

-dale 

[Urban Rainforest]

2 hours ago, Billeb said:

Steve, about how many years ago did you acquire the Latifrons? I agree by the way, I don’t find Latifrons as slow as others have stated previously. Even my small plant has flushed twice a year for the last few. They are awesome plants and yours looks great. Needs to be grounded!! 🤣🤣
 

-dale 

Dale, I aquired the Latifrons about 15 years ago from Braden and bought another one that had 2 leaves. The interesting thing is the 2 leafer seed had 2 embryos and I ended up with 2 seperate plants. Those plants flush every year too but only have 5” caudexs. And yes all my plants need to be grounded but ground suddenly got very pricey here in so cal. It is the plan though and Im working towards that👍
Stevo

[Urban Rainforest]

A couple flushes on the softer side. Cycas Platyphylla

[Urban Rainforest]

Cycas Species silver

[Tom in Tucson]

2 hours ago, Urban Rainforest said:

A couple flushes on the softer side. Cycas Platyphylla

Being a newbie of cycad cultivation, I'm interested in how well this species grows compared to other (sometimes occasional) blue species from Queensland in ease of cultivation.

What others have you tried?

Hi 111°, Lo 79°

[Urban Rainforest]

6 hours ago, Tom in Tucson said:

Being a newbie of cycad cultivation, I'm interested in how well this species grows compared to other (sometimes occasional) blue species from Queensland in ease of cultivation.

What others have you tried?

Hi 111°, Lo 79°

Tom, This has been a very easy Cycad to grow and honestly I have had it so long I cant even remember where I got it from. It flushes blue silver and gradually turns green. I have also grown Cycas Cairnsiana which imo is the better looking Cycad as it flushes green then turns sky blue! I had a big one that had been in the ground for years but sadly left it at my last house. Def gonna get me another!

[Tracy]

40 minutes ago, Urban Rainforest said:

Tom, This has been a very easy Cycad to grow and honestly I have had it so long I cant even remember where I got it from. It flushes blue silver and gradually turns green. I have also grown Cycas Cairnsiana which imo is the better looking Cycad as it flushes green then turns sky blue! I had a big one that had been in the ground for years but sadly left it at my last house. Def gonna get me another!

Which of San Diego 's many microclimates did you grow your Cycas cairnsiana?  My understanding was that they can be a challenge las well as cupida here.  I acquired a couple of thouarsii × cupida because they were probably easier to grow, which has been the case.  Unfortunately real estate to accommodate one is nonexistent now but I am still curious.   My challenge with some cycads is my mild weather,  lacking real hot conditions which some desire.

[Urban Rainforest]

2 minutes ago, Tracy said:

Which of San Diego 's many microclimates did you grow your Cycas cairnsiana?  My understanding was that they can be a challenge las well as cupida here.  I acquired a couple of thouarsii × cupida because they were probably easier to grow, which has been the case.  Unfortunately real estate to accommodate one is nonexistent now but I am still curious.   My challenge with some cycads is my mild weather,  lacking real hot conditions which some desire.

Tracy, I grew it in the Mt. Streets area of Clairemont in my south facing backyard in full sun. I basically grew it like you would a Horridus.

[JeskiM]

@Urban Rainforest

May I inquire about the soil mixture that you are using on your potted cycads, particularly the Encephalartos, though it looks like it may be the same for the Cycas.

Looks like it's mostly small pumice or perlite, but what's the rest of the mixture (component / ratio) ?

I ask because I have many cycads that I keep in pots because my winters are too cold here to go in-ground.  A lot of them that need to be potted up to next size pots and I am thinking about changing my potting mixture.

Thanks,

-Matt

[Urban Rainforest]

Matt, I make my own mix but as far as percentages I just have a feel for it having done it so long.  I start with a spagmum moss mixture from a company called sunshine. Its there pro mix. I used to use pumice but now that I have so many big buckets I have switched over to perlite because it is alot lighter! Other than that I add some fine orchid bark. Usually when I am potting stuff up I will mix up a big batch! I keep adding perlite until it looks right prob somewhere around 50 percent give or take. I use the same mix on my Aloes and Agaves as well. Hope this helps!

stevo

[Urban Rainforest]

4 hours ago, Urban Rainforest said:

Matt, I make my own mix but as far as percentages I just have a feel for it having done it so long.  I start with a spagmum moss mixture from a company called sunshine. Its there pro mix. I used to use pumice but now that I have so many big buckets I have switched over to perlite because it is alot lighter! Other than that I add some fine orchid bark. Usually when I am potting stuff up I will mix up a big batch! I keep adding perlite until it looks right prob somewhere around 50 percent give or take. I use the same mix on my Aloes and Agaves as well. Hope this helps!

stevo

Actually NOT spagmum moss mix but peat moss mix😉 by Sunshine pro mix. I pick it up at my local home depot.

[JeskiM]

Steve,

Thanks for sharing your soil mix !

The primary reason I am looking for a new mix is that a lot of my cycads will be going up to 15G pots and I need something fairly lightweight. 

Currently my mix uses lots of inorganics such as pumice, decomposed granite, crushed limestone, or crushed quartzite (depending on the species) and then a soil mix with peat moss and small orchid bark. So, my organics match yours, but with the inorganics that I am using, it is simply getting too heavy beyond 7G pots .. though it works well.

Here's a fairly large M. macdonnellii (6 inch caudex) I have in a 7G that needs to go up a size. That soil mix is ~ 77% inorganics making it very hard to lift.

-Matt

 

[Urban Rainforest]

14 minutes ago, JeskiM said:

Steve,

Thanks for sharing your soil mix !

The primary reason I am looking for a new mix is that a lot of my cycads will be going up to 15G pots and I need something fairly lightweight. 

Currently my mix uses lots of inorganics such as pumice, decomposed granite, crushed limestone, or crushed quartzite (depending on the species) and then a soil mix with peat moss and small orchid bark. So, my organics match yours, but with the inorganics that I am using, it is simply getting too heavy beyond 7G pots .. though it works well.

Here's a fairly large M. macdonnellii (6 inch caudex) I have in a 7G that needs to go up a size. That soil mix is ~ 77% inorganics making it very hard to lift.

-Matt

 

Matt, Your mix sounds good but what your discovering is the reason I switched over to perlite is the pummice is just too heavy! I have lots of 15 gallons pots and even some 20 - 25 gal. and I can move them all by myself. Btw macdonnellii is at the top of my wishlist! Thats a great looking plant👍

[Urban Rainforest]

Probably the craziest cycad I have is this Lehmannii x Blue Longifolious mutant. Its about 4 years from seed and has 9 leaves including its first and its only 4” tall! Check out the crazy leaf form. It is flushing right now and every time it does I hope it doesnt revert back to normal leaves. I think Im going to end up growing it in a bonsai pot.

[Tracy]

7 hours ago, Urban Rainforest said:

Probably the craziest cycad I have is this Lehmannii x Blue Longifolious mutant. Its about 4 years from seed and has 9 leaves including its first and its only 4” tall! Check out the crazy leaf form. It is flushing right now and every time it does I hope it doesnt revert back to normal leaves. I think Im going to end up growing it in a bonsai pot.

I would have  never guessed the parents of that plant correctly based on the leaflets.   That is an anomaly.   Did any of its siblings exhibit similar leaflets?  It does appear young enough that those may change as it matures but the width to length currently bears no resemblance to either parent species.   Very novel and attractive!

[Urban Rainforest]

I purchased an entire flat of the Lehmannii x Blue Longifolious. Usually when you get an entire flat you end up with a couple runts and a couple standouts. Most of its siblings are in the 12” to18” range and look nothing like this plant. I also lucked out with one of the standouts as so far every leaf is blunt tip. Its an anomoly for sure and I hope it stays that way!

[Fusca]

My Dioon spinulosum was about to flush a new set of leaves in March when we received 14" of rain in a 30 hour period!  It sat in water for over a week and the new flush was aborted.  I thought it might have experienced root rot but the caudex remained firm so I had hope.  Believe it or not it's planted in well draining soil.

Thankfully it's now trying again in spite of 3.5" of rain yesterday so it's sitting in water again!  This time should be short lived though.  Both rain events are unusual for the time of year.  🤨

[Urban Rainforest]

16 minutes ago, Fusca said:

My Dioon spinulosum was about to flush a new set of leaves in March when we received 14" of rain in a 30 hour period!  It sat in water for over a week and the new flush was aborted.  I thought it might have experienced root rot but the caudex remained firm so I had hope.  Believe it or not it's planted in well draining soil.

Thankfully it's now trying again in spite of 3.5" of rain yesterday so it's sitting in water again!  This time should be short lived though.  Both rain events are unusual for the time of year.  🤨

I hope it pulls through for you! The flush is looking good. Send some of that rain my way☔️In So Cal we got a drought going!

[Merlyn]

17 hours ago, JeskiM said:

The primary reason I am looking for a new mix is that a lot of my cycads will be going up to 15G pots and I need something fairly lightweight. 

Currently my mix uses lots of inorganics such as pumice, decomposed granite, crushed limestone, or crushed quartzite (depending on the species) and then a soil mix with peat moss and small orchid bark. So, my organics match yours, but with the inorganics that I am using, it is simply getting too heavy beyond 7G pots .. though it works well.

My mix is somewhat similar, though I use a generic local "topsoil" for my organics with a bit of pine bark mulch and cypress mulch tossed in.  The big box store "topsoil" is similar to Kellog Raised Bed & Potting Mix, as long as I pick the lightweight bags.  The heavy bags are usually full of sand and muck.  I mix that up and then add Turface MVP and/or perlite to about 50% by eye.  The downside of Turface or perlite or pumice (compared to stuff like DG) is that it retains a lot more water.  So if you switch from DG to perlite you'd probably need to add less water.  This might not matter on more tropical Encephalartos, but will definitely matter on the South African blues like Trispinosus, Arenarius, Horridus, etc.  I've struggled with those due to our daily afternoon thunderstorms.  They tend to get root rot after winter. 

I ran across a guy who did water drainage tests for various bonsai components.  The numbers are water loss after soaking in a jar and draining, so Coconut coir retained 85.4% of the initial water and lost 14.6% by weight after draining:

• Coconut Coir 14.6%
• Akadama 26.7%
• Kanuma Pumice 29%
• Diatomaceous Earth 30.2%
• Compost 31.6%
• Pine Bark 33.3%
• Turface MVP – LECA 36.2%
• Perlite 36.4%
• Commercial Peat Moss 40%
• Vermiculite 41.7%
• Sand – coarse grit 67.6%
• Lava Rock (Scoria) 76.5%
• Expanded Shale 84.6%
• Granite Chips 94.4%

As you can tell, Turface and perlite hold about the same amount of water (slightly less than pumice) and retain a ton more than gravel and granite chips.  You'd just need to make sure that you account for the extra water retention.

[Tracy]

Encephalartos lehmannii, last season's cone falling apart and this season's flush on one of its other caudices.