From my perspective as a Lithops, your desire to water is the single greatest threat to my existence. I am not a fern or a peace lily; I am a child of the desert. My entire being is engineered to survive on mere droplets for months at a time. My roots are fine and susceptible to rot, and my body is designed to store all the water I need for a whole season within my paired leaves. When you water me on a weekly schedule, or even just when the topsoil feels dry, you are essentially waterboarding me. The roots suffocate and die, and a rot sets in that is usually fatal. You must learn to read my cycles. I will tell you when I am thirsty by the appearance of wrinkles on my sides and a slight sinking in of the top surface. This "wrinkling" is my polite way of saying a drink would be welcome, not a desperate cry for help.
You often plant me too deeply in the wrong soil and place me in a dim corner. This is a recipe for a slow, etiolated demise. In my natural habitat, I grow with most of my body above the gritty, rocky ground to maximize sun exposure and ensure quick drainage. When you bury me up to my "neck," the base of my body stays damp, inviting rot. I need a pot that is at least 3-4 inches deep to accommodate my taproot, filled with a very gritty, mostly inorganic mix (80-90% perlite, pumice, or coarse sand). Furthermore, I crave bright, direct light for at least 4-6 hours a day. Without it, I will stretch unnaturally, becoming tall and distorted as I search for the sun. This weakens my structure and makes me vulnerable.
This is a critical and often misunderstood part of my life. Once a year, I grow a new pair of leaves from the center. These new leaves will draw all the moisture and nutrients they need from the old, outer leaves. To you, this looks alarming. The outer leaves will shrivel, turn papery, and may look dead. Your instinct is to help by pulling them off or, worse, watering me to "plump up" the old leaves. This is a catastrophic mistake. Watering during this molt interrupts the natural process, often causing the new leaves to rot or the old leaves to remain, leading to a deformed double-body. You must be patient and leave me completely dry until the old leaves are completely dry and papery shells.
I am a slow-growing, patient being. My root system is delicate and does not appreciate being disturbed. Repotting me annually, or every time you acquire a new decorative pot, causes me immense stress. It can take weeks or even months for my roots to re-establish themselves. The only times repotting is necessary are if my current soil mix is clearly wrong and holding too much moisture, or if I have become so crowded in a clump that the individual plants have no room to grow. Otherwise, please leave me be. I am content in a small pot for years.
In the harsh desert environments I call home, the soil is lean and nutrient-poor. My needs are simple. A heavy-handed approach with fertilizer will scorch my sensitive roots and force growth that my structure cannot support, making me soft and susceptible to disease. If you feel you must fertilize, a highly diluted, low-nitrogen fertilizer applied only once, at the very beginning of my growing season (usually autumn), is more than sufficient. For most of my life, I need nothing but water, sun, and the minerals already present in my gritty potting mix.
