So here we are.  The Plant Provocateur's 100th post.  Thanks to everyone for checking TPP out!  I've received a lot of awesome feedback and love for what's going on here.  This is only the beginning.  Remember, pass it along.  If you know of anyone that's into plants and also into the idea that anyone can or should lavish themselves, in some aspect, with the beauty that comes from the 'outside' world invite them to experience The Plant Provocateur!

Today we get a taste of something strangely beautiful, mysterious, and rare.  All the way from Namibia comes a unique succulent known as Cyphostemma juttae or the Namibian Grape.  It looks like something out of The Lord of the Rings. But in reality, this grape relative is a slow growing succulent that rises out of the ground with a swollen, water-storing trunk that is dressed in tatters of paper-like bark.  From this trunk, thick, fleshy, super-sized succulent leaves extend, curl, and contort their way outward.  In autumn, it produces a showy abundance of poisonous grape-like fruits deep in rich rosé color.  The overall look is voluptuously sculptural and gorgeously grape-a-liscious.

Wanna get a conversation going?  Find yourself one of these and grow it as a specimen in a container inside or out. Protect from frost.  If you live in a warm temperate climate like California or the heat of the south try it in the ground.  Give it full sun, well-draining cactus mix, and low water.  Plants can grow up to 4 to 6 feet tall and wide.  Now you may google this plant and see that some postings consider Cyphostemma juttae to be an ugly plant.  Well, The Plant Provocateur is here to change all that.  Today, ugly is the new pretty. Strange is the new 'hot'!  Let's expand our horizons and celebrate the bodacious and bizarre.  It's all about perspective.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.