What are lithops and where do they come from?
Lithops are found in arid regions in widely separated, sparsely populated colonies. The average rainfall in areas where Lithops occur is generally less than 20″, with most of the rain coming in spring and fall. A few rely on mist or fog as their main source of moisture. They are found growing in many diverse habitats, on quartz grit or gravely flats, stony ridges and hills of sand, decomposed granite, quartzite, shale, schist and limestone. The vast majority of Lithops species occur in the Nama Karoo and the succulent Karoo and are especially common along the Orange River valley in the Northern Cape that runs between Namibia and western South Africa.
How are lithops adapted to their arid habitats?
Lithops are able to survive in these dry areas because of their capacity to store water, with almost the entire plant devoted to this function. Each individual plant consists of two succulent leaves fused together in the shape of an inverted cone. The fissure at the top of the plant is the division between the two leaves. There is no stem; the taproot joins abruptly at the base of the leaves. The thick leaves can store enough water for the plants to survive for months without rain. In periods of droughts they shrivel and shrink below the soil level.
Staying small and keeping a low profile helps minimize the effect of the intense heat and sunlight where they live. But this also presents a problem of getting light to the photosynthetic apparatus of the leaf cells (droughtschlorophyllyll) that are underground. To solve this dilemma, the wide leaf tips have windowed cells that allallowows light into the inner portion of the leaf, where it is diffused before reaching the chlorophyll, which is scattered along the interior leaf margins.
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