ISI 2025-7 Adenium socotranum Vierh.
This extreme succulent has been much in demand, especially since a photo of magnificent specimens in habitat made the cover of theCactus and Succulent Journal in Sep-Oct., 2000. Since then, some unscrupulous vendors have tried to pass off A. obesum or A. arabicum as the Socotran species. Those others are at least easier to grow than A. socotranum. We have managed to sustain a plant field-collected by John Lavranos in 1967 by keeping it in a small pot in our Conservatory and watering carefully. Thirty years later, Lavranos was able to return to Socotra with German botanist Bruno Mies who has done botanical research on the island every year since 1993. He was able to collect seed of the adenium in 1997. Seedlings from this collection were distributed in 2004 as ISI 2004-5. Success in cultivation with these has been in warm greenhouse conditions where minimum temperatures do not go below about 50°F or warmer, or by growing them outdoors in more tropical climates like that of southern Taiwan or Thailand. This allows the plants to tolerate regular watering, though less when dormant. Nevertheless, plants tend to grow up before they grow out, creating pachycauls with long, tapering, solitary trunks. Joe Stead has been particularly successful in growing healthy compact plants in his greenhouses at Orange Coast College and has offered the current crop for ISI distribution. His conditions, with minimum night temperatures of about 70°F, seem to promote rapid thickening. There is no confusion about their identity. They were grown from seed from hand-pollination under controlled conditions of three plants from seed from the same collection as ISI 2004-5: Bruno Mies # 667 (not 676 as originally published), seed collected March 17, 1997, ca. 120m above sea level, near the village of Di-Ishal at the N end of Wadi di Faroh, Socotra. These very plants are the subject of the article about propagation of this species in the Summer 2025 issue of the Journal. We offer this next generation.
Photo © 2025 by Dan Houston.
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