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Is the scorching sun sucking the life out of your succulents?

Even though drought tolerant, not all succulents and cacti are created equal for hot temps

SAN ANTONIO – We see them all over San Antonio, the big floppy cacti or other succulents that usually do really well in the heat.

And yes, for the most part cacti like prickly pear can handle the full sun and triple digit temperatures with little water for several months, but not all succulents are created equal.

Mark Fannick with Fannick’s Garden Center explains some of his customers assume all succulents can get the same treatment and live through these scorching temps.

“A lot of folks who buy succulents are cacti,” Fannick said. “I think they belong the same family cacti plants are desert plants, full sun able to take the heat and so forth. Succulents actually grow in a higher elevation area. So even though they get full sun, they have the ability to cool off at night saying like in Arizona, it is 100 degrees in daytime, but at nighttime it goes down into the forties.”

If your pretty succulents are in full sun and getting brown burn marks and you keep watering them thinking that’s what they need, they are getting double damage.

Fannick explains let them completely dry out between waterings and maybe water them once a week, and protect them from scorching in the sun.

“Morning sun would be ideal for succulents too, about maybe 2 p.m. and then either bring them into the shade or filter light after that,” Fannick said.

For information on how much water your drought and heat tolerant plants need this summer to survive, don’t forget to check out our previous story.


About the Author
Sarah Acosta headshot

Sarah Acosta is a weekend Good Morning San Antonio anchor and a general assignments reporter at KSAT12. She joined the news team in April 2018 as a morning reporter for GMSA and is a native South Texan.

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