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Plant parents and would-be plant killers alike are in love with succulents. The former can nurse them into glory and propagate them, while the latter can usually manage to keep them alive. These hearty plants typically require little more than bright light and occasional watering to become the best-looking houseplants in your pad. (Sorry, fiddle-leaf figs, but you’re fiddly.)
Lest we get overly confident about how easy succulents are to grow, however, they’re not foolproof. I managed to kill a zebra plant this winter. It happens.
Still, the succulent trend has been thriving since around 2007, according to Illinois Extension. Growers are selling them like crazy, according to Garden Center Magazine, and consumers are looking for different varieties to expand their collections.
So, if you already have jades and echeverias, burro’s tails and aloes, you might be looking for the next exciting variety of succulent. And wow, do we have a looker for you.
Check out the pearlescent clear leaves of the Haworthia cooperi, also known as the cushion aloe, in this tweet from @sfsu_greenhouse:
Haworthia cooperi with its famous “windows.” I have almost 40 of these ready for a future plant sale, whenever we are allowed to sell plants again! #haworthia #haworthiacooperi pic.twitter.com/ArC4gVoQlh
— SFSU Greenhouse (@sfsu_greenhouse) March 25, 2021
It’s like a cluster of jewels! Gorgeous.
Perhaps the name “Haworthia” is ringing a bell. White-striped zebra plants, Haworthia fasciata, are particularly popular succulents that look like mini aloe plants (but aren’t). Their cooperi cousins have fleshier leaves that are so translucent that sunlight will shine right through them, making them appear to glow.
Self-proclaimed “plant nerd” @amandaraewright proudly displayed her Haworthia cooperi on Instagram, writing that she’d wanted one since she was a kid, when she wasn’t allowed to touch her grandmother’s plant.
“Now I touch them all I want,” she wrote. “I even popped one of these bubbly leaves just because I wanted to. It was like bubble wrap but juicy.”
I admit I was curious about what happens if you pop one of the leaves, in part because there’s no way I’d do that to my own plant (if I had one).
Succulent-loving Twitter user @SUCCdotCARE reminded us that these fleshy, pearlescent plants are sometimes referred to as “alien eggs.”
Alien eggs
#haworthiacooperi #haworthia
I just wanna bite them!!
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•#succulent #succulents #cactus #cacti #succulove #succulentlove #cactuslover #succulentgarden #leafandclay #succulentsofinstagram #cactusmagazine #succulenthoarder #succulentaddict #plants #su… pic.twitter.com/o6tRXO0ANz— succulent.care (@SUCCdotCARE) November 3, 2020
Many Etsy shops offer Haworthia cooperi for sale, and the prices range from around $10 to more than $30 for a large one. Succulent Box sells 2-inch cooperi for $5.45 and 4-inch plants for $9.85, and eSucculent has a variegated cooperi at $26.95 for two.
There are sellers on Amazon and Ebay, too, and if you search, you’ll find other growers selling them online. Your local garden center might have them as well — I’ve seen them at my local shop.
If you decide you’ve got to have one of these, keep it out of direct sunlight and don’t over-water it. But do keep it out on display where you can enjoy seeing this little beauty every day!
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