Yes, like dried urine on walls behind taverns. More importantly, I could smell it on my plant, but the only member of the household not genetically related to me could not.

I have a Crassula capitella subsp. thyrsiflora that has a similar stench, though not nearly as bad.

Pagan

IME, Aeoniums in and of themselves don't smell, so I'd look at the soil and what's in it as the culprit.

People's senses of smell seem to vary wildly, in my experience... Some people cannot detect certain scents, while others can't tolerate them at all..

I appear to have a very sensitive nose, which is both a good thing and a bad thing....

This thread has given me a giggle but it explains the smell I get sometimes when I am in my garden near my aeoniums. I never even suspected the plant .. I thought it was the neighbour lol!! It doesn't always have the bad smell though, so maybe it isn't the plant but the next time I get a whiff of it I'll smell the plant and see ... When no one is looking of course!!

Tahneal

It may be that it smells more or less at different time of day, just like some other plants. My brugmansia smells very strong in the evening, and much less during the day, and so many other flowering plants.

Pagan

Very good description - I can imagine the 'aroma' :)...

Rina

Pagan,

I guess dried urine on the back of a tavern is a way to describe it. The thing I found odd though, is the other cutting I had from this plant (which didn't take root) never smelled. I'm putting it down to just being a smaller rosette but it's still really weird in my own opinion.

Blue

Sometimes I get a whiff of something other people don't smell. Generally smells don't bother me. However, I've met some people that are bothered by almost anything. Some seemed like they were badly offended somehow only by the smell and wouldn't stop talking about it. I haven't noticed a smell from Aeonium. Maybe not all of them have that distinctive smell. I wonder if my cat has ever smelled an Aeonium.

Aeonium balsamiferum smells quite nice...

rubbing the leaves produces a slight but funky odor. on the other hand, the stink of euphorbias is just about the worst.

davez7anv, someone gave me a couple Aeonium today. I noticed the same thing. The ones I have don't seem stinky but I rubbed my thumb on a leaf and smelled my thumb. There was some smell. My cat thought my thumb smelled interesting.

My friend has two large aeonium plants in large pots near his front door. One has a bright shiny chartreuse green leaf color and texture and it does not small at all. The aeonium is a bit less shiny with an ever-so-slightly smaller leaf structure and a bit more gray-green than is common to many aeoniums. It is this one that has a terrible odor as described earlier, and yes it does small like dried urine on the back of a tavern. Other than these attributes they are almost identical. As a landscape designer I have worked with aeoniums for years and never encountered this attribute.

In fact, I did not believe it when my friend told me to be careful. So I stuck my nose in the plant to sniff and the scent got all over my beard and the scent followed me around everywhere until I eagerly washed my face and hands. Now I definitely believe that this may be genetically unique to certain aeonium plants. Even so, it is not a characteristic of any of the aeoniums in my yard or in the landscapes I have had planted. In the future I will cautiously check plants when purchasing them.

Yes. I first noticed if after accidentally brushing a large, mature plant. Yuck!! My partner can’t smell it. For better and worse, I seem to have a more sensitive sniffer.

Yes, some aeoniums stink horribly.

The one in this picture stinks (it has slightly thin leaves, turn reddish in sun; looks very nice but smells very bad). It doesn't smell like urine to me; something more in the vomit family of smells. HOWEVER, I'm not sure things are that simple. I'm not sure this aeonium stank when I planted it, because I was already aware of the problem and wouldn't have used it. I had had another type (a low-growing one with smaller, more feathery red leaves) that I really liked, but it smelled so bad when I worked in my cactus garden that I yanked it all out and gave it to my neighbor. She had it on her front porch. Out of curiosity, a year or so later, I smelled it, and it didn't stink. So I took some back and planted it; it's growing fine and those pieces don't stink, either. None of my other varieties of aeonium have this problem. So no, it's not your imagination; it stinks. But whether this is an intrinsic and irreparable aspect of the plant, who knows...?

Sharon