Echeveria rosea

As you can see a very striking colour contrasting nicely with Aeonium arboreum. This particular Echeveria looks good all year round with nice pink margins to the leaves in summer colouring intensely from December through to April, here photographed in late February with flower racemes elongating. Curiously the brightest colour comes not from the flowers which are barely showing in this photograph but from many bracts. The flowers are small and straw yellow produced two thirds up the length of the raceme, the top third consisting of sterile bracts only.

I grow these plants against my south facing house wall and protect with fleece only on frosty nights. The compost is composted bark/shreddings which I rather like as it is free draining and slow to break down. I have also added perlight and fine clean grit to keep the soil open. I feed quite often with fish, blood & bone meal fertiliser, watering well in dry weather.

I also grow Echeveria agavoides on a raised bed and graptopetalum which cope well with mild frosts. Echeveria cultivar 'Perle von Nurnburg' also grows well outdoors as do species of Dudlaya and there are many more worth trying.