Coryphantha maiz-tablasensis in flower

 

    It may seem difficult to grow it, but it surely is easy to get it to flower in my growing set-up. I use a largely mineral soil-mix, comprising granite, some clay-ish calcarous stone chippings, large diameter river gravel, some sand, perlite and 5 to 10% wormcastings. Except for the perlite, everything is sort of DIY, as I never buy materials but prefer to collect it myself while visiting various places in the (nearby) mountains and hills.    

    Mature plants are kept outside, in full sun, with no shade and are subject to intense heat during the entire summer months. I give them rain water once per week or two times a month, depending on the heat and humidity. During the winter they are kept without water in a cool dry room. It is normal for them to shrivel and loose body volume in this period. The watering only resumes when outside temps exceed 18 degrees Celsius. I rarely feed them nutrients. If so, they should be poor in Nitrogen and applied in small doses at the beginning of the season, after the first waterings.

How I keep my lophophoras happy

 

    It begins with the soil mix which must be coarse and gritty. I usually use small gravel gathered from mountain river beds, perlite, volcanic rocks, granite chippings, coco choir and worm casts - produced in the house. I keep mature specimens in full sun, with no shade, even when temps are above 40ºC. Waterings are done twice a month or so, with rain water only. If kept in the same pot for several years, I usually sprinkle some fresh worm castings on top once a year as seen in the picture above. Other diluted nutrients are used very rarely and only if organic, with low N values and high PK.

    During dormancy I stop watering completely and keep them in a dry and well illuminated environment - natural light only. Temperatures may drop below freezing point with no consequences whatsoever. 

     The specimen in the pictures is the El Huizache variety originally from San Luis Potosi, Mexico, 7 or 8 years old and produced copious amount of seeds the last 3 years - cross pollinated with the same or other SLP varieties only.  

    On a side note, I might have some seeds for trade so don't hesitate to contact me in private if interested.

Hard grown astrophytum capricorne var. niveum

     This mature astrophytum capricorne var. niveum is now resting as it's winter time here and temperatures are at freezing point. It does not receive water at all this time of the year and is kept in a well aerated, dry and well lit environment - sunlight only. It is a cold hardy specimen which can withstand temperatures of -10ºC, although in my set-up it rarely gets below 0ºC. In summer time it is kept in full sun at temps often above 40 ºC and flowers profusely if watered abundantly once a week or so. I use exclusively rainwater.

 

    The soil mix is coarse comprising perlite, coco choir,  small gravel, sand and self produced wormcasts. I rarely use nutrients on it - once or twice a year maybe. If so, I use something preferably organic with low N and high PK values enriched with microelements.

 

Mammillaria magnimamma, SB 40

Mammillaria magnimamma, SB 40, Hidalgo, Mexico.

A coarsy soilmix and lots of sunshine will keep this one flowering and offseting. During winter, it should not be watered or be kept at freezing temperatures.

Mammillaria bocasana ssp. eschauzieri

  

This one is easy to flower as long as it is potted in the right substrate, that is a very coarse, gritty sand with chunks of granite and very little humus. It is quite resistant to cold temperatures if kept dry and flowers abundantly throughout the whole growing season. Perfect plant for beginners, as it does not require much space and will accommodate low light. 

Field number: REP 1236

Locality : Mexicó : San Luis Potosí (Ahualulco, 1900m)

 

Acanthocalycium thionatum var. copiapoides in the mood for love

Easy species to grow and flower. If kept in full sun, the colour and the spination gets spectacular. In its dormancy period it shrinks in volume and tolerates low temperatures fairly easy.

Echinofossulocactus multicostatus care

Also known as Stenocactus multicostatus, it is relatively easy to care. It likes a porous, fast draining soil and might tolerate low light levels. If kept in full sun, it develops nice sturdy spines as depicted above.

The wavy ribs offer an ideal shelter for potential pests and bugs so spraying the plants with a light insecticide dilution is advised time and time again. My plants also seem vulnerable to temperature drops during the autumn. Dormancy should be encouraged as soon as temperatures go below 10℃ during night time.

If all things are right, it flowers profusely in the spring season.

Echinofossulocactus grandicornis flowers

Mammillaria standleyi, L086

Mammillaria standleyi, L086.
Collector : Alfred Bernhard Lau
Locality : Mexicó : border Chihuahua - Sonora (Sierra Obscura 200m) 
Fairly easy to grow, requiring typical mammillaria care. Not sure about its frost resistance though as this is the first season it rests at low temperatures.

Echinopsis flower

Easy to grow. Good drainage, ventilation and a cold winter rest ensure next year's flowering.

Mammillaria longimamma

Mammillaria longimamma aka Dolichothele longimamma flowering and unhappy 'bout its Lebensraum.
Easy plant to grow and reproduce. It loves just about any fast draining growing medium and flowers profusely after a bit of winter cold. In fact, given the right conditions, it produces so many offshoots it fills a medium pot in only one growing season. So plant it in shallow pots and do not exaggerate with either nutrients or waterings in order to keep it close to its natural form.

Echinocereus viridiflorus v. cylindricus, SB 378, Brewster County, Texas, USA

Echinocereus viridiflorus v. cylindricus, with field number SB 378, collected by Steve Brack in Brewster County, Texas, USA. If planted in a fast draining soil and kept rather dry during humid or rather cold nights (less than 10℃), it should present no significant problems in cultivation. Ventilation and a cold rest period during the winter months are also necessary.

Astrophytum myriostigma cv. Fukuryu

Astrophytum myriostigma cv. Fukuryu bursting with seeds. Most probably the father is a Astrophytum capricorne. Next season offsprings shoud be fun and that's alright since I do love foldings and spines. And experienced cactus collectors told me that that astrophytum offsprings resemble more the genetics of their father.

 This is how the flowers of the same Fukuryu cultivar look like...

Echinocactus grusonii, GM 1216

I like to keep track of the plants I am growing. Knowing the exact species denominations and the original habitat of of your plants is essential in the attempt to keep them alive and happy.

This one is a seedling of Echinocactus grusonii I bought two years ago and slowly acclimatized to thrive outdoor. The long spines are an adaptation to the large quantities of UV it received during the summer. In the dry and cold rest periods, it turns a bit purple.

Field number : GM 1216

Collector : Grzegorz Matuszewski

Locality : Mexicó : Zacatecas (San Juan Capistrano, 1100 m)

I encourage you all to buy only cacti with a field number attached. You'll not only know the name of your plant, but also the specific climate where it came to evolve for so many thousands years.

Ferocactus and the snow

An early November snow caught some of my ferocacti outside. Night temperatures dropped to -5℃. While most ferocacti species withstand even lower temperatures for short periods of time in their natural habitat, the high humidity levels they encountered in this case may create some problems. Being outside, the ventilation was more than sufficient and now they seem alright in their dry, cold and bright winter rest.
Species involved were Ferocactus stainesii var. pilosus, Ferocactus rectispinus, Ferocactus glaucescens, Ferocactus wislizenii, Ferocactus pottsii, Ferocactus latispinus and Ferocactus gracilis. As some of these species thrive in the central and southern parts of Mexico where winters are mild and snow very unusual, it is questionable whether they can survive in this harsh climate. I am curious myself tbh and the answer is five months or so ahead...

Notocactus scopa

Notocactus scopa is the first cactus I bought and grew successfully. It is an appropriate cactus for beginners as it tolerates well a lot of inherent mistakes of an enthusiast cactus rookie grower.

For three years, I had it in almost pure coco choir soil mix with some perlite, sand and wormcompost additions and it still managed to survive and flower. It seems to like bright light, but will tolerate indirect sunlight or even some shadow during the hot summer afternoons. A winter rest at a minimum of 5-7℃ will encourage the plant to flower in the next season. Watering and fertilization should be rather infrequent. My neglect in these matters probably kept it alive for so long.

I do not know if this plant is frost resistant. This winter it is resting at negative temperatures - for relatively short periods. So I'll have the answer the next spring.
Update: I should mention these photos are from 2014. The very last one is from 2017.

 

Frailea asterioides var. harmoniana, KH 604

Fraileas are relatively easy to grow cacti. They need a porous, fast draining soil and enjoy quite frequent waterings during the growing season. When temperature drops, keep dry and at positive Celsius temperatures.

This particular specimen was collected in 1998 by Bruno Knutti and Christian Hefti in a locality North-West of Mario Rubio, on Ruta 31, Salto Uruguay. I grew it hard, outdoors, with lots of sun and hot temperatures during summer, and it could probably tolerate some frost during the rest season. However, I keep it at around 10 degrees Celsius, completely dry.

Lophophora fricii

Lophophora fricii - here in flower - is relatively easy to grow. It prefers a slightly basic soil with almost mineral content but it may accommodate, as in this case, some worm compost and even coco coir. Say 20% of the total soil mix. Another addition was perlite... too bad it tends to rise up at the surface when watering is done from above.

By the way, watering is sparse. Say twice a month when the weather is fine - that is over 28 degrees Celsius - and no high atmospheric humidity is encountered. Too much water will make it burst. It can take quite a lot of sun and cold if grown hard.

My understanding of the concept of hard growing will be explained later on.

Unorthodox grafting

Since I had some moldy badly neglected Trichocereus bridgesii seedlings at the beginning of winter season I tried a grafting technique which for some may seem unusual.

First of all the timing was completely wrong as grafting is usually done in spring or summer when both scion and stock are in full vegetative growth.

Second, I used Chamaecereus silvestrii (Echinopsis chamaecereus) as a stock which is rather unique. I've failed to find a single reference anywhere for this species being used as a stock in cactus grafting. The logic behind my choice is that this plant is almost impossible to kill, takes all kinds of abuse in cultivation as regards soil, light, water, grows fast and roots quickly given decent conditions.

Third, Trichocereus bridgesii is usually at the other end of the grafting process, not on top, but at the base. I just wanted to see how fast it will grow if grafted. The seedlings were almost dead anyway.

I made three grafts, kept them in a warm place with poor light during the entire winter, watered twice a month or so. Only one took off!

The growth speed is good, probably better if kept on its own roots in the same conditions. The scion is a bit etiolated from the lack of light, but it will recover during the spring.

So the experiment worked. Chamaecereus silvestrii may be used as a stock in cactus grafting. The technique works even in the winter season. Myths busted!

An introduction

It's been a while since I've started to grow cacti. All this time, I tried to gather as much knowledge as possible about their proper cultivation. To my surprise, while there are tons of information on their classification and species description over the web, there are relatively  few places with pertinent and specific cultivation tips. To my mind, this is the most important aspect for any cactus grower.
With my limited time and experience, I'll try to offer here my views on cactus care. Hopefully, someone will find them useful.