Succulent

I've had a small pot of aloe vera growing behind the kitchen sink for many years, which is a perfect location for a plant that likes sun. The sink's in a corner, with windows above it (facing to the east and north) on both sides.

Aloe's a very forgiving plant, which grows without a whole lot of effort on my part. All I do is water it every couple of weeks. I can't remember the last time I repotted it, but the last time I noticed it was getting a bit overgrown, with several of the plants spilling over the sides of the pot:

I was amazed. How could they continue growing like that? I added repotting the plant to my list of things to do. In the meantime, I put the plant back in its spot, carefully propping the dangling plants against the windowsill so they wouldn't break off. This week I got around to the repotting.

My normal plant maintenance area is right outside the back garage door. All the supplies I need are close to that door and easy to bring out. I can do my work in the grass, so there's no mess to clean up. When I dumped the overgrown aloe out, it was pretty root bound, but the individual plants were easy to pull apart. I figured out there were nine plants wedged in the pot, along with several pups (little, new plants without much roots). Some of the plants were nicely-formed, with straight fans, but others were grotesquely shaped, and growing almost horizontally.

I put the three nicest plants back in the pot with fresh potting soil. They should have plenty of room to grow now. The extras went into three 3" pots, each with two large plants and a few pups. Aren't they crazy looking?

I offered the extras to my Facebook friends (and had one taker). I'll post the rest on Craigslist; they should be gone soon.