A small collection: 2015 and beyond

[7george]

I think - yes, if you have a sunny and warm spot for this cactus you can start some careful watering. These plants usually wake up early in March, but lack of cold and favourable conditions can cause new growth even now. I have similar one I got last year from a local store but at ~ 15 C it is still dormant and knowing that its root system was weak when I repotted last spring I'll keep it dry until seeing signs of growth.

[Fatich]

It's staying on the windowsill and the temperature is around 13' now. Should i water or wait for spring months?

[Steve Johnson]

It's staying on the windowsill and the temperature is around 13' now. Should i water or wait for spring months?

I've found that Eriosyce senilis does best with deep watering every 4 weeks in winter. However, it assumes that the roots are established, and your E. senilis isn't there yet. I think you'll be fine if you hold off on watering until spring. The roots should be well-established before the end of the growing season, so next winter will be the time for the winter watering care I just described.

[Fatich]

It's staying on the windowsill and the temperature is around 13' now. Should i water or wait for spring months?

I've found that Eriosyce senilis does best with deep watering every 4 weeks in winter. However, it assumes that the roots are established, and your E. senilis isn't there yet. I think you'll be fine if you hold off on watering until spring. The roots should be well-established before the end of the growing season, so next winter will be the time for the winter watering care I just described.

Thank you for your informations!

[Steve Johnson]

As the odometer is about to tick over into February, here are some nice offerings for you...

Last weekend was a great time for some flowering on my red-headed Irishman:







View from above, 1/17 on the left:



Mammillaria perezdelarosae showing good progress with its buds -- once again 1/17 on the left, followed by today:



Now we'll check in with 2 Turbinicarpus on their way to February blooming. Turb pseudopectinatus (1/8 on the left)...



...and valdezianus (1/17 on the left):



Gymnocalycium stenopleurum showing 3 weeks of bud growth:



Among the 3 Gymno species I have in my collection, this is the only one that'll set buds early in the year.

Here's something I always look forward to -- brand-new buds on Eriosyce senilis!



Let's zoom in for a close-up:



1 bud is obvious, but if you're observant, you'll see 2 more on the lower left. And there could be 1 on the upper right too. I'll have more progress pics as we move along -- would you like to go on bud watch with me?

The weather this week was favorable enough to give a bunch of cacti their monthly winter sips Tuesday night. With daytime highs in the upper 70s, the sips were sufficient to put touches of new growth on 3 that are camera-worthy...

Strombocactus disciformis -- new spines have been slowly emerging over the last several weeks, but these buds are totally new:





Mamm deherdtiana just waking up:







The hernandezii woke up a couple of weeks ago, although it clearly enjoys its latest sip:



There's a cold winter storm bearing down on SoCal, and tomorrow is expected to be a genuine soaker. As I've mentioned before, February is typically our coldest month of the year, so what you're seeing here could be it for winter growing. However, it's also time for my reliable late-winter bloomers to get busy -- and I think we'll be in for a lovely month of flowering!

With the happy comes a bit of sad involving one of Hotel Winter's residents. More details to follow.

[Steve Johnson]

This is really disappointing, and of course it had to be the Melo matanzanus from C and D Plants that was doing so well.

Earlier this week I was inspecting the residents of Hotel Winter. As I looked at the matanzanus, I noticed a white patch on the base and a brownish one right below the cephalium. Ooh, not good. As I gently probed the patches, they turned out to be squishy -- in fact the spot on the base bored all the way through into a rotten core. Here we are to commence yesterday's sad proceedings:



2 autopsy photos:





So how did this happen? The answers are contained in the following pics, but they need some interpretation:



I know the drill -- in winter, light watering every 3 weeks and let the mix dry out between waterings. Last time my matazanus got its "sip" was on 1/9, and the mix should've been dry by now. But as we see here, it was still moist. Perhaps these winter waterings of mine weren't as light as I thought. Or did selecting the wrong pot set me up for a fall?



The Azalea pot on the left is what the matanzanus went into when I got it. It did perfectly well through last winter as I followed the routine we're describing. (By the way, that's waterproofed terracotta, so we can forget about evaporation as a significant factor in drying out the mix.) Comparing them side-by-side, it's useful to know that both pots were getting the same amount of water with each application, so we can also forget about the possibility that I was accidentally drenching the glazed ceramic pot in my routine this winter. What got me was misjudging the plant's ability to grow its roots down into a deeper pot. Obviously that didn't happen -- without roots to fill down more in the pot, the water had nowhere to go but stay in the mix. Maybe I should've actually decreased the amount of water for the plant's sips this winter. Then again, adult Melos are notoriously touchy about their roots, and the only conclusion I can reach is that the matanzanus wanted to be in a fairly shallow pot regardless of the mix I'm using. While I have to chalk up this experiment as a failure, at least the lesson can tell us about their limitations as we try to keep them alive and growing well over time.

I love the species, and because I won't give up on trying another matanzanus, here's the game plan moving forward:

1. The 4" pot diamater is good, but I'll need a glazed ceramic pot with a depth of 3-1/2" -- a little shallower should be fine too. If I can't find a ceramic pot with the right dimensions, UV-resistant acrylic paints are easily found, and it should be excellent for durable waterproofing of the 4" terracotta Azalea pot I already have.

2. M2G is the first place I think of. I emailed Miles Anderson about it, but unfortunately it'll be 2 years before he has matanzanus with cephalium in stock. I'll go on the hunt starting in April, and I may get lucky with other sources I can go to. California Cactus Center, although only as a last resort since A. it's a crapshoot as to whether they'll even be available, and B. if they are, past experience indicates that it won't be until late June. That's later in the growing season than I'd like, and buying a juvenile plant is a possibility coming from one of my preferred online sources. To see one turning from juvenile to adult before my eyes would be a nice new experience, so I'll keep an open mind on this issue.

3. Being "Mr. OCD" ( ), I keep notes on precisely how much water I give to my 2 Discos and Uebelmannia for their winter sips. I was doing the same with the matanzanus, so when I get a new one, I'll adjust the amount of water downward to whatever is appropriate for the pot. Then I'll update those notes accordingly.

It'll be months before I know if my hunt is successful, so as I patiently wait, we can return to more pleasant subjects in the near future.

[george76904]

Sorry about the matanzanus! Also sorry that last fall I got the last one from m2g after he had them listed out of stock, he told me he had one more with a small cephalium. So I got it. I have been using your trick of watering with a spray bottle, and so far it is doing OK, but it hasn't pushed up any fruit. Even though it has flowered before.

[Steve Johnson]

Well, it appears that way, and after a winter storm last weekend led to a couple of very chilly days, SoCal is now in the middle of enjoying spring-like temperatures. We'll begin this story with the return of Hotel Winter's residents to their outdoor spots a few days ago. Let's see if they were bothered by 10 weeks of darkness indoors. First up, Discocactus crystallophilus:



Nope, being in the dark didn't bother it at all. Neither did my D. buenekeri:



Could that cephalium actually be growing? I wondered about the possibility since my place was acting like a heated greenhouse when I situated Hotel Winter in the bedroom. If there was any cephalium growth over December and January, it wasn't appreciable. Yeah, I know -- a crappy photo, but this before-and after shows the plant on 1/10 and yesterday:



The explosion of beige wool you see on the right came in over the week. Did the indoor warmth help? I think so!

My Uebelmannia multicostata back out on the top shelf, with the Puna and and Cumulopuntia I recently acquired in the background:



The Uebelmannia did look a bit peaked as it emerged from Hotel Winter, but its color is quickly coming back. (And in case I forgot to mention this before, the plant has been on the same winter sip schedule as the other residents.) While I'm happy about the amount of rain SoCal has received thus far, the incessant downpours I expected for L.A. this winter didn't appear. That's okay -- at least my Hotel Winter experiment worked pretty well, although I'm not sure if it'll be necessary to do this again.

We'll switch gears as we look at some interesting behavior on a Gymnocactus ysabelae. The plant gave me its first flower in early March 2 years ago. Then no flower last March -- if this one is among the cacti that need a cool winter rest to flower, last winter certainly didn't apply. The ysabelae's apical wool in the growing season retreats during wintertime. For comparison here it is in early July and again yesterday:



The snow-white wool on top looks fresh, and it may be the harbinger of a new bud that could appear soon. The difference between last March and now is telling:



May not seem like much, but it's enough to make me keep the old eyeballs out for the possibility of a bud. By the way, it was kinda disappointing to see not a single flower on my 2 Sulcorebutias last spring. If this winter has been cool enough to give them the rest they want, hopefully they'll bloom for us in a few months!

With these cacti there's no doubt about what they're up to. A month of bud progress with Turb valdezianus, starting on 1/8:




The valdezianus will pop first, but my other budding Turb has a longer way to go -- pseudopectinatus starting way back on 12/22:




Eriosyce senilis getting in on the act -- last weekend and today:



While the flowers on senilis will upstage other winter-blooming cacti you may have, it's still nice to see what these Mammillarias can do for us. Mamm perezdelarosae -- behind schedule compared to my previous 2 winters, although worth waiting for as the bigger buds are close to blooming:



The red-headed Irishman with a bumper crop of buds and flowers in progress:





There's no sign of rain in my local 7-day forecast -- with daytime highs in the 70s and 80s plus lows in the mid to upper 40s, a dry winter would guarantee an early spring for the beginning of March. However, El Nino is still lurking out there in the Pacific ocean waters, so a very wet March and April could be in SoCal's near future. Not even the front of portable GH 3.0 would be enough to keep in the heat if that future includes persistent cloud cover in my area. But if this delays the start of my growing season, so be it -- California needs the rain! As we wait to see what shakes out weather-wise, at least there are more flowers we can enjoy together.

See y'all again soon!

[Steve Johnson]

Oh, I just can't resist the temptation to hover, can I? But more often than not, it pays off...

Gymnocactus ysabelae, yessiree that's a brand-new bud.



While we're here, let's zoom in on the Erisoyce senilis -- the growing point is definitely active as it shows buds and new spines:



If your powers of observation are good, you'll be able to count 11 buds. Hmmmmm, think that's a personal record. The senilis was due for its monthly winter soak last Saturday, but I had to delay it until the bitterly cold nights coming off that storm were done. The chill was off by Thursday night, and a nice deep drink came at the perfect time. We may be seeing senilis flowers in a couple of weeks.

We'll sign off for now with a look at the Irishman, 4 in bloom today:



This beats the heck out of anything I've seen since the plant started flowering 2 years ago. All those buds coming in -- unbelievable!

[Steve Johnson]

In my previous post, I showed you a new bud on my Gymnocactus ysabelae. In this one, we'll lead off by rewinding just a tad to the day before I discovered the bud:



Now let's zoom in on the growing point -- same day on the left, followed by the view 3 days later:



The "after" pic was from 2/9. Here it is again on the left -- you could barely see that bud from the side, but you'll notice a nice change on 2/13 (yep, Valentine's Day):



As the flower opens:





Like I've seen with so many other cacti in bloom, the flower wasn't fully open on day 1. Give it another day, and this is more like it:



Not bad, huh? Just to review, the ysabelae produced its first and only flower in March 2014, then nothing last year. This year -- not 1, not 2, but 3! Flower #1 getting ready to open for business again on the 16th, and here's a nice shot of the buds coming in:



From today, flower #2:





#3 won't be far behind.

Since I received it in summer 2013, my Mammillaria perezdelarosae has been a reliable winter bloomer, although not exactly prolific. At least that's what I thought until I started seeing buds pop out all over the place toward the end of January -- on 1/30 and 2/6:



The perezdelarosae's first blooms of the year on 2/9:





Forget roses -- I think that special someone who loves cacti would rather have this on Valentine's Day!







Or would you prefer something in red and pink?







All the buds and flowers I've seen on these Mamms are mind-boggling -- and the shows aren't over yet! Back to the perezdelarosae, here on 2/17:



The red-headed Irishman looking beautiful today:





February wouldn't be quite the same without a Turb valdezianus doing its colorful thing. Mine is happy to oblige, although this gives you an idea as to how long it'll take to see the species go from buds to blooms -- progress from 12/20 to 1/30:




Accelerating bud development on 2/7 and 2/13:



No Valentine from Mr. valdezianus, that came a few days later:



The flowers weren't all the way open on day 1, which is consistent with what I'd expect. Good thing about valdezianus in bloom is the fact that its flowers last about 7 days, so we have plenty of time to enjoy them. A cool, cloudy February 17 (our only rain of the month arrived in L.A. that afternoon), followed by yesterday:



Same dates with a view from above -- these flowers are gorgeous, and it's interesting to note a change in the petal color:






To cover everything I have going on this month, 1 post simply won't do. With more buds and flowers to show you, plus some hints of a possible start to the growing season already, we'll keep the February report going -- stay tuned for Part 2!

[george76904]

Hey Steve, I saw that teedeecacti on eBay had a matanzanus with a cephalium for sale right now. I know that their shipping is expensive but they always have some nice plants and do combine shipping.

[Steve Johnson]

Well, my friends, some wonderful things have been happening since I posted Part 1 last weekend. So without further ado, here are more photos of cacti in flower to end the month.

Gymnocactus ysabelae on 2/23 -- flower #2 still going strong, with #3 opening on its 1st day:



From yesterday:



Mammillaria perezdelarosae on 2/17 -- I forgot to post this pic already, so here you go:



The view 5 days ago, and this is a gift that keeps on giving!





Following on the lovely display produced by my Turbinicarpus valdezianus, here's pseudopectinatus going from bud to bloom:









I've been watching the buds on my Eriosyce senilis grow steadily over the month, so we'll rewind back to the 6th and the 13th:



Again on the 13th, as the buds were showing up well enough to give us a view from the side -- emerging from that lovely tangle of spines:



Ooh, we're getting closer...



The first bud opening on 2/23:



From yesterday -- day-glo magic!







This is just the beginning of a gorgeous flush, so it'll give us something we can really look forward to in March. But we're not quite done with our February flowers yet...

And what a wonderful surprise! During my first 20 years of cactus collecting, Stenocactus never figured hugely, although I always kept a few. But dang if I can remember seeing one in flower. Of the 2 I have now, Steno lloydii did the honors when it favored me with its first flower. The species does most of its blooming in early spring, so I wasn't looking out for buds yet. Aside from that spot of rain I alluded to in my last post, the days this month were dominated by highs in the 80s and 90s. Yep, that's early spring alright. You can see the full details for yourself here, but the pictorial update I posted there today is very much worth repeating here:









So what about that early spring? A weather change could put it on hold starting next weekend, so this is something I'll have to keep an eye on. In the meantime, there are enough signs of it to rate a 3rd and final part to conclude my February report. Coming soon!

[Steve Johnson]

As promised, there are a few nice things to go along with those lovely flowers that put on a show last month.

Epithelantha bokei going dormant at the end of October, then not so dormant on 2/20:



That bokei looks like it's about to do something. First-ever flowers on the way perhaps? That'll be in July, and the new growth I'm seeing gives me an intuitive sense that the plant is mature enough to start blooming this year.

Pelecyphora aselliformis:



While the head on the right isn't doing anything, the other 3 are showing touches of new growth.

Astrophytum capricorne showing new spines, a new bud, and something else that could be another just beginning:



Mammillaria crucigera -- its first buds of the year detected on 2/16, then more buds 10 days later:





While mine went from buds to blooms rather quickly last year, the plant is taking its own sweet time now. But that's okay -- what they lack in size, they make up for in color, so the crucigera's flowers are worth waiting for!

Now here's a Mamm setting buds ahead of schedule -- deherdtiana on 2/21:





The species is an opportunistic grower, so it was no surprise to see the plant waking up thanks to our unseasonably hot February. Here's what the end of the month gave us:



Another cactus setting buds ahead of schedule -- Strombocactus disciformis way back at the end of January:



A month of progress on the buds:




The chief bud close to popping on the 27th:



Gymnocalycium stenopleurum:



Winter stress makes for some very attractive colors on the stenopleurum's skin. We'll top it off with a bud that's close to blooming:



In terms of flowering, the only problem with disciformis and stenopleurum is that they need a lot of heat to get their blooms wide open, so the flowers won't look their best this early in the year. With that said, there's nothing wrong with showing you partially open flowers on both plants, so I'll include the pics with my March flower review.

Now here's a real surprise -- Epithelantha micromeris with buds on 2/20, then a day later, and finally flowers on the 23rd:





This is my first time seeing micromeris in flower before early March. A prolific bloomer, and whenever we see its first flowers of the year, we'll know that its growing season is starting!

Also as promised -- the first of 2 back-to-back winter storms came through last night, and #2 is supposed to produce rain late tonight into tomorrow night. Then storm #3 should arrive toward the end of the week. While daytime highs in the upper 60s/low 70s over the next week or so won't be a problem (portable GH 3.0 gets nice and toasty with the front on!), overnight lows in the 40s will be enough to put my growing season on hold. Hopefully not for long, though, but El Nino is still out there with the potential for throwing cool, rainy curves in April.

Up next, would you like to see some gorgeous flowers for the beginning of March? On the way, my friends!

[Steve Johnson]

It's been a good week for much-needed precipitation here in SoCal, and before winter returned to my area as the first of 2 back-to-back storms began dumping rain last Saturday night, I took advantage of some wonderful photo ops. For your viewing pleasure...

Checking in with the Gymno stenopleurum -- 2/27 on the left, then 4 days later:



Is the bud ready to pop yet? They can be remarkably patient about waiting until there's enough heat for it, so if the plant's first bloom of the year hasn't opened already, a warm-up later this week may be sufficient.

Strombo disciformis, same timeframe:



With the front of portable GH 3.0 off, fog can give the cacti on the front row of my plant bench a nice dewey complexion. I enjoy the low clouds and fog that come with my coastal
microclimate -- while I don't get as much of the latter as I'd like, I was glad to show you the Strombo with a bit of fog magic in the early morning of 3/2. Unfortunately its first flower wasn't inclined to open much, but I have 2 more photo-worthy blooms I'll show you soon.

Stenocactus lloydii -- my first experience with the species in bloom, and I had no idea how persistent those flowers could be!





Given my schedule during the work week, it's helpful when cacti keep their flowers open overnight. Such was the case with my lloydii, and great to catch all 3 in bloom on the 2nd.

And now for the main event -- Eriosyce senilis building its flush on March 1 and 2:








A day with slowly thickening storm clouds on 3/5:





What a fantastic display! But it wasn't the only one I saw that day -- Mammillaria deherdtiana with its first of many flowers for 2016:





Threatening clouds in the afternoon produced a few drops of rain, so up went the front of the portable GH. The weather last Sunday was pretty wild, dumping .5" of rain in about 2 hours. Very unusual for my part of L.A., but then again, this is what El Nino can do. Once the rain was done that morning, the clouds thinned out enough to give the bench a daytime high of 73. Now let's peek in through the front and see what we got:





Yowza! The species normally does its blooming in spring, but it was phenomenal to see my deherdtiana keep going well into summer last year. Will this beautiful Mamm give us a repeat performance? While we wait for the answer, hopefully I'll have a full-on flush to show you as the growing season kicks in. Speaking of...

Thanks to the portable GH, the daytime highs on my plant bench are great regardless of whether it's sunny or cloudy. However, cold nights coming right after the latest series of winter storms tend to be problematic -- I'm so eager to give the collection its first deep drink of the growing season, although overnight lows dipping below the upper 40s make me a bit reluctant to "pull the trigger". L.A. is showing a decent chance of rain over tonight and tomorrow morning. Then after the clouds clear out, we're supposed to have a week of warm, sunny weather. A consistent pattern of overnights above 48 over the next several weeks is what I'm looking for. Between the local 7-day (National Weather Service) and 15-day (weather.com) forecasts I'll review Friday night, I may finally get the answer to a most important question -- is this small collection's growing season ready to replace winter sips with springtime soaks? We'll find out the results together!

[Steve Johnson]

The weather situation I was hoping for last week turned out to be quite favorable, and with an equally favorable forecast for the next couple of weeks in the offing, the collection got its first deep drench of the growing season Saturday night. Using stored rainwater too -- yeahhhh! The changes from winter shriveling to spring plumping will show up in this thread soon. But in the meantime, I'm eager to share my recent experience with y'all on some much-needed repotting. First up, the last 2 cacti which finally completed my "terracotta out/glazed ceramic in" project...

Stenocactus zacatecasensis -- when it arrived in July 2012, followed by its "liberation" from terracotta on 2/28/16:



3.5 years of growing in "dirty" mineral mix didn't seem to bother the roots, and in fact they look quite healthy, don't they?



All that fuzzy stuff you see is actually a multitude of root hairs -- while the zacatecasensis may have been dormant above-ground, its roots certainly weren't. Now for the move into a Joe Wujcik
pot filled with clean pumice-DG mix:



Mammillaria guelzowiana -- joined the collection in July 2013, then unpotted for transplanting last weekend:



Wow, what happened to the roots? DG fines clogging up the mix is what happened. At least the roots are still alive and apparently trying to grow:





Just what the cactus doctor ordered -- another Joe Wujcik pot filled with clean mix:





The guelzowiana is quite capable of growing a more extensive root sytem in clean, open mix. Right now the pot seems too deep for the plant, and since I haven't a clue about the growth rate of its roots, I'll have to be careful about how I approach watering. If there's not enough of a root system to take full-on soaks yet, the water won't have anywhere to go, and it'll sit in the mix before it has time to dry out as it should. Every 2 weeks is the correct watering frequency for the growing season, but I'll use some intuitive thinking and go with sips instead of soaks. If this approach lets the mix dry out completely between waterings, the idea is that the guelzowiana's roots will grow out and down in the pot as they seek out water. My guess is that by the end of May, the plant's root system should be healthy and extensive enough to accept deep watering. We'll get the results of my little experiment over the summer -- hopefully it'll be good!

Here's what I said concerning my Leuchtenbergia principis in October:

On my to-do list for early spring, and when I unpot the plant, I think what we'll find is a decently healthy taproot and underdeveloped fibrous roots sitting on top of a DG "brick" after the fines settled down in the pot over time.

And this is what I found in the pot when I extracted the plant 3 weeks ago:



Yep, exactly what I expected -- there was no way the taproot would penetrate that brick, and not much in the way of fibrous roots either:





Since the Leuchtenbergia is back in its pot with clean mix this time, I think the change should do wonders for a strong recovery of the roots. And better roots will lead to a healthier plant, so I'll be interested to see if there's good progress to show you by the end of summer.

It was kind of a downer to look at what happened to the roots of these last 2 cacti, so I'll end Part 1 on a high note showing wonderful progress with this Epithelantha bokei -- when it arrived on 12/23/13, followed by the view when the plant was preparing for its repot 2 weeks ago:



A couple of nice observations here. First, the bokei's roots filled the bottom of the pot. Second, a pleasant surprise revealed by the unpotting:



Indeed, indeed -- that's a brand-new pup! It'll be hidden again as 1 of the pots I found at Desert Creations last spring is being gainfully employed:





Well, here we are at the beginning of spring, and I already have a backlog of pics I'm not ready to post yet. What will I have for you next time? We shall see!