Cold-tolerant outdoor South African succulents

[Aloinopsis]

Is there a list of cold-tolerant South African succulents? I know there are several species but I don't know of any place that groups them all together. I would like to plan a theme garden for the future.

[Jangaudi]

Massive amount of plants to choose from I think, and most will be frost tolerant to a certain degree. Anyway you'll have to consider summer growers or winter growers or mixed with opportunist growers. Either way you have a lot of amazing stuff to choose from. I love South African plants ! I think a couple of Aloe dichotoma growing above a field of winter growing bulbs is mandatory
Here's a neat website, which can be a little tricky to navigate, but they got this advanced search here, in which you can choose plant types. They even have a map of the different regions, and which region has rain when in the year !
http://pza.sanbi.org/plants/search/advanced

[Aloinopsis]

Thank you. I have seen that website before but you are right, I do have trouble navigating it. I will try again.

[Aloinopsis]

Well, I have tried again and I can't figure out how to sort things on that site by cold hardiness. It's entirely possible that I am just not smart enough!

[Steve-0]

Well, although I haven't explored cold-tolerant South African succulents, yet, the idea of having a list at my fingertips is intriguing.

So I tried my luck at the website above. Caveat: I'm on a Mac not a PC - don't know if that makes a difference or not.

But my results were very satisfactory. A couple of images below show how I pared down the catalog from 321 pages of South African succulents to a mere 74 pages. Surprisingly, I recognized a number of them and even see the American Agave listed.

Anyway, what I did was select my parameters in the top section by clicking 1. succulents 2. Sandy soil 3. full sun 4. good in a pot 5. drought resistant and 6. the climate Zone #4- Highveld which should be indicative of cold nights and frost.

Then hit SEARCH and voila! a manageable list below of plants to choose from. At least that's what it seems like I achieved.

Hope this helps...YMMV.

[Aloinopsis]

Well, although I haven't explored cold-tolerant South African succulents, yet, the idea of having a list at my fingertips is intriguing.

So I tried my luck at the website above. Caveat: I'm on a Mac not a PC - don't know if that makes a difference or not.

But my results were very satisfactory. A couple of images below show how I pared down the catalog from 321 pages of South African succulents to a mere 74 pages. Surprisingly, I recognized a number of them and even see the American Agave listed.

Anyway, what I did was select my parameters in the top section by clicking 1. succulents 2. Sandy soil 3. full sun 4. good in a pot 5. drought resistant and 6. the climate Zone #4- Highveld which should be indicative of cold nights and frost.

Then hit SEARCH and voila! a manageable list below of plants to choose from. At least that's what it seems like I achieved.

Hope this helps...YMMV.

Thank you. This does help because I did not realize that the Zone 4 would have the coldest temperatures.

I have some Delosperma that has lived outside for 3 years, which has got made to the point of wanting to try a larger South African outdoor garden. I am in USDA Zone 6 or 7 (depending on the map) so we do often have significant winters but if the South African Delosperma survives there must be plants it grows alongside that would too. That's my thinking process, at least!

[Steve-0]

You're welcome! I only know a bit about ZA but do know HIghveld means cool at night. The click confirmed "frost". I'm in USDA Zone 5 in the Salt Lake Valley of Utah. We have a huge, IMO, day to night temperature shift of up to 40 degrees sometimes but usually much less than that as the seasons roll through. We're at 4500 feet above sea level - high mountain desert climate with low-ish humidity and 300 sunny days annually. I's grew and lived in the HOT, HUMID southeast US most of my life. This dry, bug free environ suits me just fine...but I miss the beach. We have cold hardy succulents here that are outdoors year round. I have some from my neighbors. Don't know the names though. I've got a long way to go in this hobby.

[Jangaudi]

Usually they list plants under "ecology" which grow in the same area, so if you search for "delosperma", all results will reference to delosperma, so also under "ecology".
http://pza.sanbi.org/plants/search/adva ... Delosperma
or those from zone4 :
http://pza.sanbi.org/plants/search/adva ... n%20winter

Also, I found some neat maps of SA climate zones, some are simplified, others very complex :

climatic-zones-of-sa.png (117.05 KiB) Viewed 1420 times

koppen_geiger.jpg (105.43 KiB) Viewed 1420 times

Also, many bulbs can take a little frost, but your zone 6/7 sound too cold for that.
Zone 3 (in SA, winter rain) also has some frost. A detailed descriptions of the zones is here :
http://pza.sanbi.org/horticultural-zones

[Aloinopsis]

Thank you also. All this information is great.

I also realized I should consider plants native to Lesotho. I haven't found much information specifically about them, but I'm sure it's out there.

[esp_imaging]

Delospermas include some of the hardiest SA succulents. Some types are sold as outdoor plants in the UK.