Yep, I really do want to touch 'em, the G. leaves. That's what I thought you were going to say about the palm leaf from the pics I saw yesterday. Pics do say 1,000 words, but it's those last 37 that made it clear for me. Thanks! That's an unusual, way-cool palm. About the Pelargonium, did you mean that you hybridized a plant and this is a cutting from that offspring? How old is that plant? Toni has a cool one that's inspired me to try to keep one as a house plant but since reaching that conclusion all I can find is red, which I don't prefer.

plantomaniac08 Thank you yes it will be Lithops. DavidL.ca The 45lt Terrascape is "Air plants only" Lighting will be a twin Aquarium 4ft unit 1 plant and 1 daylight tube, that unit/combination grows aquarium plants very well. The Air plants are in an open tank misted every morning. The Lithops will be growing in 1-3 river stones about 10cm deep and will never be watered directly except a morning mist as required. The tank will have a glass lid with a 10cm opening back and front plus about the same at the ends, if required I can install a computer fan at each end but I doubt it would be required. I live in Victoria Australia which is considered more of a Mediterranean climate. All the watering is done from the bottom via a tube from the top via what is called a UGF Under Gravel Filter when used in a fish tank. The plate is about 2cm high, to check the moisture I use a standard garden Moisture Meter To stop the garden soil from clogging up the grates I will add a layer of 1-3mm river stones at least 3cm deep first

Exotic_lover your comment is indicative of the I/me/my mentality that is slowly destroying this country across the board. You want to import just this and that to add to your collection. And some body else just wants to import a different this and that for their collection. Multiplied by tens of thousands of individuals across the country who all just want to import one or two things for their collection and we will have a biological recipe for ever worsening environmental, agricultural and economic disaster for this Australia and future generations. Fortunately our MPs and authorities are starting to belatedly see the environmental light and clamping down on this national behavior if only due to the economic impacts it is having for agriculture and the country in general. You are not going to win on this because your insignificant little hobby or business is not going to win against the national economic agricultural impacts. Finally we environmentalists and ecologists have the ear of government. Besides Australia has over twice the biodiversity of Europe and North America combined. And much of that is plants and many of these plants are succulents that are different and unique from the rest of the world. So stop judging native plants by the pathetic array you find in Bunnings etc, and start doing some real exploring of the universe of Australian flora through the Australian Plant Society. Did you know that, technically, Brachychiton (commonly known as bottle trees) are in fact succulent plants. Wood does not swell significantly with water but the trunks of bottle trees do, much like the giant saguaro cacti of the north American deserts. What about the epiphytic ant plants of QLD - a unique and very drought tolerant alternative to stag horn ferns etc. Or the plethora of pink flowered Calendrinia from the outback. Or the Doryanthes that are closely related to the Agave. The native glassworts from the coastal salt marshes. Sarcozona, lithophytic orchids and many other species featured in Attila and Michele Kapitany book "Australian Succulent Plants" http://australiansucculents.com/ There is a life time of collecting in that single book and undoubtedly even more that Atilla, and those who follow his example, are yet to discover. Time for you to stop living in the cultural cringe based horticultural past.

Hi Baldric, I live in Victoria too, Melbourne. I too am wanting to build a hot house for my ever increasing collection of cacti. I already ahve a hot house (1.5 x 1 meters) which is built on a steel frame. This eables me to sit down at the table and do my propagation, maintenance etc.. This house has now become full and I am in the process of drawing out some plans. I must confess that I have'nt thought of dimension like 10x6 meters. I was htinking more on 4x6 meters, which should be sufficient. I keep most of my big cacti outside and they do not get affected by frosts for the past 3 years.(fingers crossed). I use a hot house only for cacti like lophophora, gymnocalycium, lithops, cereus, notocactus etc which need to be kept dry during winter.