Lithops olivacea L.Bolus

Aizoaceae

Climate known 3 photographs Cactus or succulent

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Lithops olivacea is a species of the genus Lithops under the family Aizoaceae. The name olivacea refers to the Latin word for olive (oliva) combined with the suffix -cea, meaning "of the likeness", producing the idea of "olive likeness". Lithops olivacea grow primarily in the Bushmanland of South Africa. They grow most abundantly in the regions of Aggeneys, Pofadder, and Namies. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Lithops olivacea”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Lithops

Lithops is a genus of succulent plants in the ice plant family, Aizoaceae. Members of the genus are native to southern Africa. They avoid being eaten by herbivores with their camouflage as small stones, and are often known as pebble plants or living stones.

Text from Wikipedia, “Lithops”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family

Aizoaceae

Described by

L.Bolus

Native to

Cape Provinces

Wild records

41 in range· 12 open

At a glance

Warmest month

33°C

Jan, mean day; nights 17 °C (CHELSA)

Rain

111mm/yr

no wet month · peak Feb 18 mm (CHELSA)

Light

23–58DLI

mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)

In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person

Grouped as a cactus or succulent by the genus Lithops, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: no rainy season to read (111 mm a year); the temperature rule's cooler six months are October to March in the northern hemisphere. Habitat rain 111 mm a year, wettest February at 18 mm, driest August at 4 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 23 to 58 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -0.6 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Lithops olivacea var. nebrownii D.T.Cole.

Cultivation

Grouped as a cactus or succulent by the genus Lithops, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). The table holds no figure for this group, which spans too much for one minimum; the cold floor is the habitat's alone, and no prose comes from the table.

Its year Rain rule: no rainy season to read (111 mm a year); the temperature rule's cooler six months are October to March in the northern hemisphere.

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

Rain at the habitat is 111 mm a year (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Under 120 mm the rain rule reads no rainy season, and the growing-season rule infers nothing from it. The temperature rule reads the cooler six months as April to September. Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere; shifted six months for a northern-hemisphere collection: October to March.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 111 mm a year, wettest February at 18 mm, driest August at 4 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

111 mm a year at the habitat. Wettest month February at 18 mm, driest August at 4 mm; 2 months under 5 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 83 mm to 439 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 23 to 58 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 23 to 58 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 20, the highest 90th-percentile month 58).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -0.6 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -0.6 °C, the absolute minimum -3.0 °C, about 6 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 40.1 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 4.8 °C in July (across the envelope cells 4.3 °C to 9.2 °C), warmest day 33.0 °C in January (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -0.6 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 42 to 49% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 8 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale

Figures by month

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
Day °C	33 / 23–34	33 / 24–34	30 / 23–32	26 / 22–27	21 / 19–24	17 / 16–21	17 / 16–20	20 / 18–21	24 / 19–25	27 / 20–28	30 / 21–31	32 / 22–33
Night °C	17 / 16–18	17 / 16–19	16 / 15–17	13 / 12–14	9 / 8–12	5 / 5–10	5 / 4–9	6 / 5–9	9 / 8–11	11 / 11–12	13 / 13–15	15 / 14–17
Rain mm	9 / 7–17	18 / 11–23	17 / 11–25	18 / 13–43	6 / 6–50	5 / 4–62	6 / 5–69	4 / 3–54	4 / 4–39	8 / 6–24	7 / 5–19	9 / 6–18
DLI	56 / 53–57	51 / 48–51	43 / 40–43	34 / 31–34	27 / 24–27	23 / 20–24	25 / 22–25	31 / 27–32	40 / 36–40	48 / 44–49	55 / 51–55	58 / 53–58
RH %	42 / 42–60	43 / 43–60	45 / 44–59	46 / 45–58	47 / 46–57	49 / 48–56	48 / 47–56	46 / 45–58	44 / 44–58	43 / 42–58	42 / 42–59	42 / 42–60

Each figure is the median across the 8 grid cells holding the 9 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 2381:3988 (-29.075, 19.425). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -3.0 °C, 1st-percentile night -0.6 °C, 99th-percentile day 40.1 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 8 distinct grid cells holding the 9 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 2381:3988 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell -29.00_19.375, lapse-corrected +173 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 949 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.

Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.

NativeCape Provinces

Kew's description“succulent perennial” · “desert or dry shrubland”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here

Map marker-29.298, 19.008 · in the densest population, 39 records (95% of those in range)

Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 41 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 12 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 20 km away. 32 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.

The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 41 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Photographs: (c) leandra-k_89, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (2).

Photographs: iNaturalist and GBIF media did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Lithops olivacea, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

The influence of epidermal windows on the light environment within the leaves of six succulents

K.J. Egbert, Craig E. Martin, Thomas C. Vogelmann (2007) · Journal of Experimental Botany

Occurrence Download