Jeff I have Cotyledon and Tylecodon with trunks and leves that look similar. I am sure glad that you cleared that up. I couldn't figure out what it was. Have you ever heard any rumors that they were actually sports of the smaller leaf Crassula ovata agentea? I have no history on these sports. I do have copies of orginal documentation when they came to the Huntington Gardens, I'll try and find it just may have where they obtained the plant. Norma

Thanks, Rina, and Erica. Yep - drilled holes in the plastic bottles. I did wire one piece on the left-hand plant. The middle plant has two pieces drawn closer together with a single wire hooking each of them. I wanted to wire more but that's all I had laying around and its quite too heavy to work with (should have went out for lighter gage wire). I was making a real mess trying to wire them up so I stopped. Maybe after they're re-established ... As for watering, the small bits in the plastic bottles have not been watered, nor has the main plant - all still bone dry. The three pots on the table got caught in the rain for a bit but I gathered them up pretty quickly so they didn't get saturated. Maybe only the top 3/4" of soil is wet/damp. So maybe I'll wait till Sunday and water them all then. I kind of winged it on the soil. I ended up buying a bag of soil from a grower that they use for their succulents. The soil seemed a little heavy so I cut it 50/50 with Napa 8822 oil dry. We'll see ... Rina, not sure what you mean by "...was the old soil hard to get rid of". Frankly I thought the old soil looked good (pic below). Maybe another rookie mistake, but I didn't try to get all the old soil from the root ball. I scraped quite a bit off the top and knocked off what would come away relatively easy from the sides and bottom. There was quite a bit of roots exposed (which all looked really good) but most of the old soil went back into the pot. The pot is bigger than before ... 13" now compared to 10" before. I wasn't sure if I should replant it any higher so I replanted it at the same depth as before. I'll have to study up on the mealy bugs to know how to recognize new white stuff from old white stuff.

Neil 1st photo: those are leaves from etoliated, kept in the quite dark room so it was all green (wintertime...) and knocked off the shelve by friend's cat echeveria black prince - I know they don't looke like it, but they are. Plant was all green, skinny leaves. While I never fuss about taking off leaves, it has to be taken right off the stem, perhaps slight twisting would help? If leave partially breaks it won't root. Howard (bikerdoc) posted few close-up photos in one of the threads. Rina

Richard chimeric nature is guilty. Because 2 types of cells (normal and chimeric) are present together in one plant. Mericlinal chimeras are produced when the derivatives of the mutated cell do not entirely cover the apical dome. A mutated cell layer may be maintained on only one portion of the meristem giving rise to chimeral shoots or leaves which develop in that portion while those that differentiate on all other portions of the meristem are normal, nonchimeral shoots. Many mericlinal chimeras involve such a limited number of cells that only a small portion of one leaf may be affected. As was the case with periclinal chimeras, mericlinal chimeras are generally restricted to one cell layer. Sectorial chimeras result from mutations which affect sections of the apical meristem, the altered genotype extending through all the cell layers. This chimeral type is unstable and can give rise to shoots and leaves which are not chimeras. Both normal types and mutated types can be produced, depending upon the point on the apex from which the shoots differentiate. Origin, Development and Propagation of Chimeras - R. Daniel Lineberger