Succulent plant

[3] Some definitions also include roots, thus geophytes that survive unfavorable periods by dying back to underground storage organs (caudex) may be regarded as succulents.

The habitats of these water-preserving plants are often in areas with high temperatures and low rainfall, such as deserts, but succulents may be found even in alpine ecosystems growing in rocky or sandy soil.

Succulents are often grown as ornamental plants because of their striking and unusual appearance, as well as their ability to thrive with relatively minimal care.

[5] Other sources exclude roots as in the definition "a plant with thick, fleshy and swollen stems and/or leaves, adapted to dry environments".

[6] The difference affects the relationship between succulents and "geophytes"–plants that survive unfavorable seasons as a resting bud on an underground organ.

[15] Horticulturists often follow commercial conventions and may exclude other groups of plants such as bromeliads, that scientifically are considered succulents.

Plants offered commercially then as "succulents", such as hen and chicks, will less often include geophytes, in which the swollen storage organ is wholly underground, but will include plants with a caudex,[18] that is a swollen above-ground organ at soil level, formed from a stem, a root, or both.

[21][22] While it is often thought that most succulents come from dry areas such as steppes, semi-desert, and desert, the world's driest areas do not make for proper succulent habitats, mainly due to the difficulty such low growing plants or seedlings would have to thrive in environments where they could easily be covered by sand.

[23] Australia, the world's driest inhabited continent, hosts very few native succulents due to the frequent and prolonged droughts.

[citation needed] Even Africa, the continent with the most native succulents, does not host many of the plants in its most dry regions.

[25] Occasionally, succulents may occur as epiphytes, growing on other plants with limited or no contact with the ground, and being dependent on their ability to store water and gaining nutrients by other means; it is seen in Tillandsia.

Succulents also occur as inhabitants of sea coasts and dry lakes, which are exposed to high levels of dissolved minerals that are deadly to many other plant species.

California is home to close to hundred succulent species that are native to the state, many of them live in coastal environments.

[28][29] In South Africa, several species of succulent have been threatened with extinction due to poaching from the wild for the black market and mining related activities.