Zebra Haworthia

Check your light →

It copes with low light, though its stripes fade there; a bright spot just out of the sun’s reach is where it colors up best, and the dark green may even pick up other tints.

Wild plants shelter among rocks and grasses and under shrubs (SANBI). Indoors, the sill of a north-facing window suits it, as does a spot beside an east-facing one or a desk a few feet back from glass that faces south or west.

One wild form, a cliff-dweller from the Enon River, shows what shade does: its leaves spread wider and curl back to catch more light (SANBI). A zebra kept dim may loosen the same way, a hint to inch it windowward if you’d like it tighter.

In January, keep its leaves from touching cold glass; NC State warns against cold drafts and anything under 50°F.

So the rosette itself gives the verdict: snug and upright says the light is working, splayed open says it’s reaching.

Let the pot dry to the bottom between drinks: about every 3-4 weeks in winter, and sooner in warm months, roughly every 14-21 days.

Aim the water at the soil around the rosette, not into its center. Water left pooling between the tight leaves can rot the plant or spot the leaves (Penn State Extension; NC State).

Its leaves keep score. In the wild they fill out firm after rain and fold into a shallow channel in dry spells (SANBI), so a zebra whose leaves have begun to cup and thin is ready for a drink, and a plump one can wait.

Pot it in cactus or succulent mix (NC State).

Gone for a while? A month is fine if it’s soaked the day you leave; its leaves carry it through.

A spiky rosette 4-12 inches tall that sends up pups around its base, slowly building a clump. Sized for a desk, a windowsill, or a terrarium; a shallow, wide pot gives the pups room.

Each rosette packs 30-40 leaves, each up to about 3 inches long, into a star up to 6 inches across (SANBI). It has no stem, so new rosettes rise from the base, and over the years one plant can become a crowd, spreading toward 2 feet wide if never divided (NC State).

In late spring or early summer it may send up a wiry flower stalk about 16 inches tall, well above the rosette, hung with small white to pale pink tubes (SANBI; NC State).

Because every pup springs from that stemless base, a crowded pot can be eased apart at soil level, each rosette taking a few roots of its own (NC State: offsets and pups).

Seen from above, each rosette reads as a star, so it shows off best below eye height: a low sill, a side table, a desk you look down on.

The ASPCA lists zebra haworthia as non-toxic to dogs and cats, and NC State calls it non-toxic to pets and humans.

The ASPCA’s zebra haworthia entry still files it under an older Haworthia name, but the answer holds either way: its entry for the whole Haworthia group names no harmful compounds, and its recent guide to pet-safe plants calls out Haworthiopsis attenuata by name.

As with any plant, a pet that eats a lot of it may vomit or get an upset stomach, which the ASPCA doesn’t expect to be serious.

So a sill shared with a cat or a desk within a toddler’s reach is fine. The only one at risk is the plant: it grows so slowly that a chewed rosette takes a long time to fill back in, so if yours has a nibbler, a higher shelf keeps it looking whole.

1. ASPCA: safe for dogs.
2. ASPCA: safe for cats.
3. NC State Extension: safe for kids.

Cats and dogs: Most of the leading sources agree.

Kids: No poison-centre listing; rated from university extension sources.

Ordinary rooms at 60-80°F suit it, and it shouldn’t sit below 50°F. It comes from dry South African scrub, so humidity down to 5% is fine and there’s no misting to do.

Temperature

60-80°F

Humidity

5-24%

Mealybugs are the common guest, tucked into new growth at the center of the rosette and under the leaves. Scale sometimes settles on the leaves and at the base of the stem. Peek into the center when you water.

• Mealybugs
• Scale

Very few. Mealybugs are the pest to watch for, scale now and then, and rot from wet soil is the real danger.

Mealybugs look like tufts of white cotton tucked deep between the leaves; scale looks like small brown bumps stuck to them. Dab them off with a cotton swab dipped in rubbing alcohol, then check again next week; if they keep coming back, an insecticidal soap spray is the next step.

Rot shows as leaves going soft and mushy at the base while the soil stays wet. Let the pot dry out completely and water less often from then on; if the whole rosette has gone soft, save a healthy pup and start again (see Propagation).

In spring and summer, feed it sparingly twice with dilute fertilizer. Twice a year, pull dead leaves and dust with a soft brush, not water. Every 2-3 years, repot into fresh gritty mix and divide off the offsets.

• Clean leaves2× a year
• Feed2× a year

A small pot with a drainage hole, not much bigger than the roots, in cactus mix or ordinary potting mix cut half and half with perlite or grit, so it drains fast. A clay pot helps the soil dry out between soaks.

Repot only when the pups fill the pot, in spring, into a pot just a size up; it’s happy a little crowded.

Food is optional: a houseplant fertilizer at half strength or weaker, once or twice in late spring or summer, is all it uses.

Pointed dark green leaves wear raised white bands, like tiny zebra stripes, in a palm-sized star. The surface is waxy and bumpy to the touch, and the rosette leaves some soil showing.