Lampranthus Species, Trailing Ice Plant

There is a lot of confusion in the naming of Lampranthus species in garden centres - any plant with pink flowers tends to be called roseu...Read Mores and anything with magenta or purple flowers is called spectabilis.
I've changed my rating to a 'positive' because this year the plants were wonderful, and unaffected by white spot.
There are many cultivars of L. spectabilis: 'Tresco Fire', 'Tresco Brilliant,' 'Tresco Red' and others, named after the island in the Scilly Isles, off Cornwall, U.K., where they grow particularly well.
They are more of a challenge to grow elsewhere in the UK, except in the most sheltered spots of Cornwall. They seem to survive best grown on the edge of a raised bed or wall, facing south, with a hedge, fence, or wall behind them, and may survive down to -7C in perfect conditions. Their small leaves and open growth allows the wet to drain away, so they aren't as prone to rotting as many other succulents.
Plants only seem to live for four or five years anyhow.

They are very easy to root - take a large cutting with five or six branches four inches long in July, by August it will have rooted,keep it in the greenhouse over winter, and by the following summer you will have a large flowering plant.

A disease is now making them a problem to grow - it appears as raised white spots one or two mm across, and it often kills the plant, or ruins its appearance. No fungicide I know cures it, but if you catch it early (4-5 spots!) and remove every affected leaf as the spots appear,you may save it - I did this year!

Well, after growing mine for at least 4-5 yrs., it finally gave up after we had 3 consecutive days of lows ranging 24-28F in Dec. 2009. ...Read MoreI'll sure miss it, but when one plant dies, another finds a new home.

Zone 8/9. Grows well in Honolulu in a container at a 1000 feet above sea level. Very pretty plant in rocky soil base.

...Read MoreCan tolerate high UV, and high winds, needs little water (do not over water) and best fertilizer seems to be APEX 13-4-12 Palm Special / 13-1.7-9.9 Elemental with Micro Nutrients, manufactured by Simplot, every 2-3 months in our location,. Unfortunately this fertilizer is hard to find in Honolulu. Tried different organic mixes but inconsistent flowering.

Only took about 3 months, in the summer months, to completely fill a 24" container from 7 cuttings taken from my next door neighbour who uses Miracle Grow. Flowering with the Apex fertilizer seems to achieve better results than theirs with Miracle Gro, flowering nearly all year round.

If you do not fertilize the plant it will have few if any flowers in a container. I cannot speak of what it might do in-ground.

Great color for the garden