Just got myself a cool pet rock :D

Some of you may remember this post I made over a year ago. Nah, who am I kidding, nobody does :D

Oh well, it's mother's day today here in Greece and yesterday I went shopping to get for my mother a nice beautifil plant. And while I was there I spotted this little interesting fella:

Here's a photo next to a regular 330 ml tin can and a pink 3d dragon for better comparison:

Now, I know this thing looks like a weird stone or something but it's actually a plant from the Lithops genus. 

Lithops are succulent plants. which are plants that have certain parts that are more thicker than usual in order to retain water, which helps them survive in places with not much water, like deserts and stuff.

Obviously, Lithops take this property to the extreme. As you can see they have no well defined leaves, stem or whatever etc. They just look like plain rocks which among other things helps them to blend with the surrounding enviroment and avoid getting eaten!

What I think is the most interesting thing about these little fellas is that, for the most part, the leaves are below the surface. However, the top of the leaves is partially or completely translucent allowing light to reach deep inside the rest of the leaves so that the plant can photosynthesize.

You can see better what I mean in the picture below:

 
(source, CC BY-SA 3.0)

"Longitudinal section of a Lithops plant, showing the epidermal window at the top, the translucent succulent tissue, the green photosynthetic tissue, and the decussate budding leaves growing between the mature leaves." (source)

Apparently, these guys are easy to grow, maintain and propagate but to be honest when it comes to plants... I don't like to take the words of others but prefer to trust my own experience so we will see how my new friend goes and handles the climate of Greece. Hopefully I might even get it to flower and produce some seeds :D

 
(Flowered Lithops olivacea, source, CC BY-SA 3.0 )

Ok, these are pretty much the basics you need to know about this Genus. Wikipedia has a nice page about them with plenty of info on them so head there if you want to learn more!

Here's a cool timelapse video showing some of them flowering:

Know of any other weird plants I could give a try? Let me know in the comments!

Photo Credit Mumbo Jumbo

All non-credited photos are by yours truly, released into the public domain because I doubt anybody would bother to credit, let alone pay, me for them.