My Alien has to be the ugliest plant in my garden, but the flower is beyond stunning.

My alien in it's current location

I recall clearly the moment that my mother, an avid gardener, pulled a threadbare blue tarp wrapped about something heavy and long, from the back of her car. Excuse my humour, but in that moment my mind immediately flew to the image of Will Smith dragging the unconscious body of a captured alien through the desert toward Area Fifty-One. You might recall the scene in the 1996 movie "Independence Day". I still chuckle when I think about it.

The image of my tiny mother, (she's become smaller as she's aged), heaving a weird looking plant out and onto the ground, is emblazoned in my memory. She was looking for a place to re-home it and thought that I might have a chance at keeping it alive. I looked at it, and honestly only saw the ugliest plant I have ever seen. Had I seen it at a nursery I would have walked past without a second glance. It was certainly not pleasing to my eye. But, I am always a sucker for helping anything that is in distress and I like to see plants go from unwell to thriving. So, up for the challenge, I've inherited the "alien" with the promise that if I don't kill it, I will pass on cuttings to one of my younger siblings, who also loves gardening.

Well a few years on, the alien has done the rounds of various positions in my garden and although it is going well, I still don't think I've found the perfect spot. It gets shifted every so often, to see if it can start to look a little less scary and unkempt. Judging from the light/yellowy colour of its leaves in it's current position, I would hazard a guess, that it is getting a little too much heat in the morning, now that the summer sun has swung around.

Orchard Cactus

The alien by the way, is actually an Orchard Cactus and according to google it should thrive in a place that gives it morning sunlight, so I'll keep it in the current spot but, I'm buffering it with other plants to help reduce any heat from the concrete around it. Surprisingly, this not-so-pretty plant has rewarded my attempts at care over time, with occasional blooms that are absolutely exquisite. It has six blossoms in the making at the moment so it must be reasonably happy. I would say that this alien has become one of my favourites, not just for it's flowers but as a unique memory of my mum, and it has earned a prime position alongside my next favourite, the Goldfish plant.