Lithops aucampiae var. aucampiae

Well, the best laid plans. I intended to play with macro in the conservatory this dull, windy morning, but my tripod has gone off to Lincoln in the back of the car. So I tried a few anyway, hand held.

I am most fond of my lithops collection, as I mentioned before. This is one of the larger species, and is very variable, even within the sub-species. I don't clean them up for photography, because in the wild the faces are usually almost invisible under sand and gravel. I like them to look a little bit natural My book on lithops, by Desmond Cole, has clean photos for identification, and these are very useful, but they do look a bit 'plastic'.

The body of the plant is divided into two lobes, which are modified leaves. The two lobes adhere together near the top of the plant, but below this there is a cleft through which the flower emerges. The remains of a dead flower are visible in my photograph. A new 'body' does the same thing, and when this pokes up through the cleft, the old lobes gradually die and shrivel. It is always exciting when two new bodies emerge from the cleft and the plant grows a new head. I find the lithops lifestyle an amazing adaptation to life in the desert. It isn't hugely successful, as they are relatively rare in their native southern Africa, but they do survive where almost nothing else does.