by Richard Pearman

Created on: July 17, 2008   Last Updated: May 15, 2010

This article includes a lot of Latin names of plants. You can look these up in books in any language or find information from search engines.

Obviously no plant is completely indestructible but some come pretty close. Let's start by considering things that tend to kill plants:

Lack of water
Too much water
Lack of light
Too much light
To hot
To cold (particularly frost but some plants will die of cold when above freezing)

Lack of humidity
Excessive humidity
Wrong pH or soil composition
Pests
Diseases
Natural life expectancy some plants don't live long normally
Lack of a resting period
Neglect by owner
Excessive fussing by owner

Some plants are parasites and need an appropriate host but they're seldom cultivated. What plants are easy to grow will depend on your conditions and if you're inclined to neglect plants or overly fuss them. Many plants can survive neglect but I'm not aware of any which can survive excessive fussing. If fussing is your problem, I suggest you get a small pedigree dog or perhaps stick to arranging cut flowers. If you really must have live plants, then perhaps you should grow bonsai trees, which need frequent pruning or learn to propagate orchids by micropropagation or something.

Most the plants I'm listing are succulents. In part this is my personal area of expertise but most succulents have lack of water, bright light, hot conditions, low humidity and neglect licked, and some can cope with other things.

Agavaceae (basically Agave and Yucca) This family are mostly very easy to grow. They will survive drought, neglect, a wide range of lighting conditions, most pests don't seem to like them and most will take a fair amount of frost in some cases to the extent that they don't really count as houseplants. The main problems are their generally large size and that they seldom flower (some Agaves are monocarpic, meaning that they flower once and then die). Yuccas don't really look succulent for those who don't like succulents.

Amariliaceae (Amaryllises etc.) Heamanthus albiflos isn't a plant you see much. It forms clumps of large bulbs that grow above the soil and have a fan shaped arrangement of short leaves. It also has clusters of white flowers. Treat like an Aloe.

Aloaceae (basically Aloe, Gasteria and Haworthia) Most people don't realize that Aloe vera is only one species of the large and varied genus Aloe. Aloes vary from small, grass-like plants to sizeable trees with some shrubs and many large, short-stemmed rosette plants in between. The larger species

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