Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Trouble shoot problems you are having with your cactus.
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Irrsinn
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Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by Irrsinn »

I was gifted a Texas rainbow cactus from a nursery back at the end of March. Following Steve Johnson's advice, I cleaned the roots (this one was caked in perlite, which I'll admit I was a little shy in digging out from the body, but I think I got clear from the roots), soaked them in peroxide, let them dry, and planted them in pure pumice. Despite some recent heavy spring rains here, the pumice approach seems to be working for the rest of my collection (even a saguaro that I treated poorly for a decade is now thriving!).

This one, however, hasn't shown signs of growth at all since replanting, and this past week is showing a rapid decline: it's turning dark at the top, shrinking, and now slumping. Photos from May 4:

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I'll confess I'm a little squicked at the prospect of determining whether that tissue is soft, but if y'all recommend it, I'll poke it. 8-[ I haven't seen any collections of bugs around the pot or on the plant. Any more transient bugs around tend to be bees after my flowering Mammillaria zeilmanniana.

Is this classic rot? Did I possibly miss some soil at the root ball? Is it salvageable, and if so, what icky surgery would I need to perform? :lol:
Cactus photos on Instagram.
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adetheproducer
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by adetheproducer »

That looks pretty dead. Give it a squeeze the spines are not to sharp on these in sure it will collapse. There is a fungus that infects the top of cacti and rot it downwards off hand I can't remember the name of that fungi but it is mentioned in one of the xerophilia magazine issues. Looks like it caught that fungal infection as the severity decreases downwards, normally rot from poor soils work up the plant from the roots and as you said the rest of the plants are fine. I would suggest throwing it away and even consider throwing g the soil and pot too.
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Irrsinn
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by Irrsinn »

I haven't poked this yet to test for squishiness, but if it's fungal, could this have been prevented with better root cleaning or some other cleaning procedure when I get a plant?
Cactus photos on Instagram.
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hegar
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by hegar »

I agree with adtheproducer in that I too believe, that your cactus has had it. Most likely your plant - which by way of the spine coloration looks more like an Arizona Rainbow than a Texas Rainbow cactus - was damaged at the top. allowing a fungus to invade the plant. Because I do grow all my cacti outdoors and live in a desert environment, I have not yet experienced a fungal pathogen that kills my plants. About a year or two ago, I was given a cactus (a good-sized Ferocactus wislizenii), which did have black spots on its epidermis. That fungus turned out to be a Fusarium sp.. I have also received cacti from Mexico twice, which had roundish dark grey, fuzzy lesions. That pathogen was yet another fungus.
Because of our dry conditions with low relative humidity fungus diseases are rare though. Most of my plants I have lost due to rot, which starts at or below the soil line and works its way up. I would surmise, that most of the time the culprit is a bacterium.
If and when you do replace your cactus, it is very important, not to injure the plant. If it was grown in a peat-based medium, then it is best, to carefully clean the roots, in order to remove organic matter. If a tiny bit remains, that would not be a problem. One of our cactus club members, who also used to work as a county extension agent, told us at one of the club meetings, that she even prunes the roots a little. Then she would place the cactus on its side for about one week, before planting it. When transplanting, do not immediately water your plant, but wait for another week or two. By then new roots will start to form and the plant will be able to take the water up a lot better.

Harald
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MagiCarpus
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by MagiCarpus »

Bummer! Always a shame to lose a beautiful plant. : scratch :

What it needs now is a proper Steve-Johnson-style autopsy. It might be dead, but it can still contribute from beyond the grave to the knowledge advancement of the CactiGuide community. :toothy10:

http://www.cactiguide.com/forum/viewtop ... =2&t=30300
I suck at identification :dontknow:
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Steve Johnson
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by Steve Johnson »

Hi Irrsinn,

First, I'm glad that you found my advice to be useful for the rest of your cacti. And second, what happened to your Echinocereus is a real shame, although there was nothing you could've done prep-wise to avoid the fungal attack. Sadly, I've had more experience with cactus autopsy photos than I'd care to, but they may be helpful as teaching tools. Here's an example featuring what I did after I lost an Echinocereus rigidissimus rubispinus to rot in summer 2012:

http://www.cactiguide.com/forum/viewtop ... 83#p244069

By the way, I think your dead soldier is E. rigidissimus rubispinus, not dasyacanthus. They're rather popular, so I don't think you'll have much trouble finding a replacement. If you find one from an online source, chances are that you'll be receiving a bare-root plant. It'll save you the trouble of having to clean the roots. However, if you get the replacement at a brick-and-mortar nursery, you'll need to do the job yourself. Be sure to clean the roots thoroughly, and make sure you don't leave a bolus of the nursery's mix up in the root ball -- my failure to do so is what killed the rubispinus you'll see in the above link. Not that this has anything to do with what you're going through, but worth discussing now in the interest of being proactive.
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Irrsinn
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by Irrsinn »

With the knife-wielding aid of a dear, dear friend who is less grossed out by squishy textures than me, we conducted an autopsy this morning.

Here's a final picture of the full body of this little critter, not only doomed from the start, but misidentified all along. :(

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Then we started poking and cutting. It was definitely... soft.

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The cut revealed the fungus:

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And a full spread shows the extent of the damage:

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Poor baby.

I tossed it, the pumice, and the pot. There is, however, a pot below the cactus table that would have gotten run-off water from the E. rigidissimus rubispinus. It's got rosemary seedlings in normal potting soil -- is that likely contaminated?
Cactus photos on Instagram.
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greenknight
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by greenknight »

Not likely to hurt rosemary - it has strong antimicrobial properties.
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hegar
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Re: Sickly Echinocereus dasyacanthus

Post by hegar »

You do not need to toss all the pots that once held a cactus which died of a rot. There are sterilizing agents around. I do have a chemical, that supposedly is used in hospital settings and is not even toxic or highly damaging to human skin. This may kill bacteria and fungi. I would have to look up, what its name is and if it is effective against all kinds of microorganisms, except for viruses of course.
In my profession as a mycologist I have sterilized and killed fungal pathogens, mainly their spores, by placing the glassware being used in a mix of 3 parts of water to one part of clorox bleach and leaving it in that solution for 10 to 15 minutes. I did not like doing this, because I do not like the fumes being produced by the chlorine bleach and it is not gentle on your skin either.
The organisms that do cause rots are part of the soil and air community and only will do their damaging work, if the plant has been weakened and a portal of entrance for them created. So, if the roots rot away, because they were in an unfavorable environment, for example because of lack of oxygen due to water logging, the structural integrity of the plant is compromised and the until then harmless organism can set up house inside your plant, destroying it in the process.

Harald
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