Surface Sand

Prologue of Habitat Series

I’ve dreamed of a lot of scenery like this. When I spent time in my greenhouse, every time I saw succulents which had been collected from all over the world, consciousness walked around the habitat. The scenery of habitat was in my mind reading old books like Euphorbia Journal. Kenya’s adenium is buried in the red soil of Kenya, which has dinged up to the many mesen, crassula and lump roots that live on the scattered plains of quartz. Chrysanthemum water that seems to be half buried and stuck to the quay, Brosfeldia that is growing rich in the gap of the rock and is no longer square … rojohora crouched in cracked mud,Ariocarpus kotshoubeyanus that has become flat like a painting. Conofitsum sunk in puddles after rain, krassura curled up glossy enough to be recessed.

The luster and surprising flatness peculiar to the place of origin.

In a rock swaikuma with only a spoonful of soil

a glossy yet tight figure that does not prolong or shrink

The more you go into cultivation in Japan, the more the wonders of origin become highlighted. It seems that there is a completely different property and physicality from granular soils such as red balls and kanuma soil, which are used in Japan. It is easy to imagine how they can go buried in such mud even if it is an Ariocarpus kotshoubeyanus, and it is considerable moisture stress as understood by trying a little. But they grow up beautifully there. There must be a secret there. I myself have been researching the use of red balls, kanuma soil, and pebbles. However, the wonder of such a place of origin seems not to be on the extension line apparently. No matter how much I accelerated, there were naturally areas that I couldn’t reach. Another direction that is different from making it fast, big, and beautiful. A series that connects cultivation and place of origin in an approach to such natural wonders. That’s what we call the Habitat Series.

In habitat series, the core part is the part to be explored, it is the soil. Surface Sand explores this. Succulents are distributed all over the world and live in various environments. Naturally, the appearance, the environmental climate, and the soil are various. When I make samples for the series, I actually introduce materials from overseas and have my friends send me a few real things. I have met a small number of overseas hoyist who grow special ones. Inspiration from traveling.

Surface Sand 01, motif of quartz-field in South Africa-Namibia

The first surface sand offered this time is based on the quartz plains from western South Africa to Namibia. If you love succulents, no one has ever thought of it. It is a place called a sacred place. Cape, Namaqua national park, Namibia. A quartz plain with caramelized, rough sugar. There are all sorts of A-to-Z methens and diverse bulb species growing there: Tylecodon, Othonna, crassula, Pelargonium, Conophytum, Lithops. It’s a land of admiration. This quartz plain is a few centimeters in the main soil, and a little water is collected, and various living jewels are grown.

There was a big doubt and the wonder which sprouted every time I thought about such a scenery of South Africa while cultivating it in Japan. In the photo below, you can see the parent sphere of the Conophytum Comptney and some of the buds of about 1mm that have dinged up beside it. Because it is naturally distributed and inhabited there, it is natural that the renewal of the generation has occurred thus in the place of origin, but this is not indeed natural. Thus, adult cells and soils where 1 mm of buds can survive dryness and mature. This can’t happen in grains like red balls and kanuma soil, which are commonly used in Japan. This wonder is the catalyst for the start of the Habitat Series, and the surface sand 01 is the result of this offer.

You can look for a “makeup stone” like this kind of roughness at first look. The bottom sand of tropical fish looks beautiful and is quite good. However, if you pull that makeup “stone” to the last, you will not be able to see the thirst of the soil in the bowl at all. The makeup stone dries soon or after that though there is a change of a little color if it is usual, and water is given though it often sees the makeup soil made black by Fuji sand. In that case, it is not possible to see the soil wet or dry at all under a dry makeup stone. It does not reflect some of the moisture in the bowl. This is very difficult to grow. To begin with, the permeability seems to be a colander in such maintained stone, and it cannot be like the puddle after rain. The water-keeping power is 0, and the growth can not be brought up in the mosted soil by this. Let’s approach the scale of nature by tilting imagination a little more rather than the scale of man who screens such as S, M, and L.

Many of these rough plains of western South Africa are made of hard quartz. The quartz which is hard like this glass also becomes weathered and rubbish in a long time, becomes fine grains and fine dust, and covers the earth. It is not difficult to imagine that the soil covering the place of habitat cannot be the same size as SML. The quartz layer eroded and weathered by the climate becomes gravel and dust, and grains of various sizes mix to make up the soil. Not to mention there, fine grains and fine dust which are destroyed horticulturally are mixed there. Because of this, after the rain, a landscape that becomes like a puddle. In general, growers dislike fine dust. It is natural because it causes clogging and root rot. “Fine dust” refers to particles of very fine size, but from the structure of the crystals themselves, there are muddy ones and sandy ones. The dust which is disliked in the bag of the akadama sand and kanuma sand is the one of the mud, has a micro water absorption structure in the crystal structure, keeps water in itself, and has water more than necessary. This can cause root rot in the cultivation of succulents.

On the other hand, many of these fields in western South Africa are made of hard quartz. The glass repelled the water, and the quartz hardly absorbed water in the particle itself. It is the same even if it becomes fine like the dust. However, when the particles are very small, a water supply force different from the water supply force of the particles themselves is born. That is the physical capillary phenomenon. Fine quartz dust, thereby capturing water between grains. In such soil, when a lot of rain rains once, water gathers once because eyes are clogged, but gradually and slowly, it is pulled by gravity and it sees in. This dust is to take a slight drizzle like the towel sucks water, to moisten several centimeters of the surface which is the living sphere, and to grow a small seedling. It’s an inspiring fact.

In this way, surface sand 01 that I will offer this time explored the physics of soil with a precise imagination while thinking about the plants of South Africa, the scenery, and the scenery. First of all, there is the original soil that is the source of Surface Sand 01, but as it is, the appearance changes every time depending on the place where you dig because there is too much dust or too many large grains floating. It starts from the place where the original soil is first sifted, and it parted into the size of the grain because it is useless with this. From dust, fine grains,small grains, medium grains, large grains, gravel … make it in good balance. From here, various formulations were tried based on fine dust. One important feature of surface sand is that it is “natural” as a concept that should not be forgotten. As I wrote a little earlier, the reason that makeup stones used in general really look “artificial” . Because the grains are too aligned. In nature, it is impossible to have only things of the same size. The “randomness” of large and small sand is the natural landscape. Surface Sand also sticks to carefully configuring this randomness, erasing “artificial”. In such a way, I re-seasoned the grains of each size that I had shifted earlier, but while trying various blending ratios, I searched for a blending ratio that was exquisitely mixed with various large and small grains that looked most natural and sandy dust, which is also the functional core part of Surface sand. And made the surface sand with the golden ratio we found. The package is packaged in a stand pouch with mouth. It is designed so that it can be poured directly into the bowl without taking a waste of time on the veranda, not accidentally spilling it.

“Habitat is the fountain of my inspiration and the climax of my ideals.

In addition to the quartz plains of South Africa, there are of course special landscapes of habitat that we want to follow. The scenery created by nature is so wonderful that makes me to go to the pilgrimage to the holy place sooner or after all, such as sarcocaulon which growing in namib desert covered with red sand, lophophora princess peony buried in white cracked mud, disco cactus covered with pure white sand…….. I’d like to try it, and I’m actually researching a series of different colors and ingredients at Surface Sand. The increase in the diversity of such materials is the real pleasure of gardening, and I think that there is epochal splendor. However, I don’t think it’s very important to see if such a landscape actually exists in the Habitat Series. It is good to make the scenery which might have existed not to mention the scenery which actually exists. The essence of Habitat Series is that it is the act of thinking about the place of origin, not the “reproduction” of what it is. The “improvisational” time to the site will also strengthen your interest and curiosity about plants. No matter where you say, it is equal to ignorance in front of nature, and in fact, not only the result taught by half-hearted intellectuals that it is this, but also the way of imagination and trial and error by oneself is what is the enjoyment of gardening. In turn, the curiosity to think about and examine the place of origin will eventually invite us to the place of origin. It connects the local area and here. That’s the Habitat Series.

Please try it once by all means. It will be an offer of 1000 yen(10 dollars) per bag.