CactiGuide.com

I hate to sound stupid but what is it? Looks at first glance like a saguaro but not growing that fast. Pachycereus something perhaps? Sue

Pachycereus pringlei. I should have been polite for the people!

Thanks for the well wishes cactushobbyman. I agree a crate & crane would be the way to go. But I felt anything better than a chainsaw was really a charm.
Where it's heading there are 2 tractors with various and sundry implements and, as I said, 2 acres of land to scoot around on. I think the nephew will use this experience and the intervening 3 weeks until I drive down to the ranch to work out how to hoist it upright and we'll frame and brace it properly when roots hit the dirt.
Fun stuff, I'd highly recommend it. Everyone is very excited.

Thanks for the confirmation. I have one about 2.5 ft tall & it has pretty new red spines so I guess it's growing. For sure not a foot a year in the NJ climate. Mine also seems to have more/closer spines. I guess that's from growing slowly. I keep telling myself that my saguaro has new spines on the very top but I need a ladder to be certain. It will be 3 years next month & his color is better & looks plumper. I'm hoping I have saved him. Sue

Great stuff here. very nice old guys.
I'd love to grow copiapoa... tried and rotted a few C. cinerea. Perhaps its time to get a greenhouse here in Central Tex.

luigonz wrote:Great stuff here. very nice old guys.
I'd love to grow copiapoa... tried and rotted a few C. cinerea. Perhaps its time to get a greenhouse here in Central Tex.

Thanks. You should get a little GH. I'm surprise at what one can get now for $500 in aluminum with polycarbonate.
Love San Antonio by the way. Visited in 2002 in early October. Yeah touristy stuff, but that Riverwalk is a champ at sunset.
I think your sunlight would do very well for the cinereas. Shaded of course, and mindful of keeping them dryish.


Update from the nephew, Pachy made it to the Riverside ranch in one piece.

My 500th post couldn't be more worthy of one of my favorite cacti.
This Saguaro was purchased in 1997 at a nursery in Phoenix when my wife and I lived there briefly.
It was about a foot tall but has been in a pot all of its life.
Looking forward to what it does in Pachy's old planting spot.

I like small aspiring towers as much as the big ones.
Here's a gang of under appreciated ceroids
Neobuxbaumia tetezo back left, Eulychnia saint-pieana center, Pilosocereus fulvilanthus front left, Seticereues roezlii (with a no ID bluish trichocereus) right center, Browningia chlorocarpa hiding in the back.
What fun it'd be if I had room to plant these in a greenhouse bed.

A crazy sea of Copiapoa serpentisulcata.
They flower, but its nothing special when it happens.
It's all about the fat clumpiness of them for me.

Beautiful - wished my rescues looked so plump & un-scarred. Don't think I have that species. Sue

So this amused me today.
One of my Copiapoa solaris grafts failed to take to its stock, it just never looked right. Fairly early on it browned at the bottom and at least half of it shrunk in.
The other half stayed green tho so I figured there was a way it would spring to action.
Today I cut away the necrosis, and the whole thing pulled right off the stock.
Upon close inspection, it was budding its own roots!
I frequently degraft cacti that root off to the side and are in plain sight, so I know it happens.
But this had hidden its progress. Must be programmed in nature to re-root vigorously as a manner of survival, as do most Copiapoas. And here's another beautiful Parodia!

Speaking of Copiapoa solaris, here are some grafts that are successful, and some on their own roots. All eventually will be degrafted someday. This Copiapoa is one of my final Bad Knize Name plants that have mostly been sorted out. Came with the C. goldii tag. Nothing named goldii is trustworthy in my estimation. My MG "goldii" seeds have grown into something like a calderana. I just don't like the name.
This one looks like a fairly straight ahead cinerascens. I like its short spines and sturdy comportment. Because dang I hate it when a Copiapoa elongates and grows tall and lanky. No danger of that with this one. I have set seed with pollen from a cinerascens I've grown from Ricardo Keim seed, but those are kind of soft, almost C. fiedleriana-like and I'm not sure I like them too much. I'd rather have more of this one, so I'm anticipating the seedlings getting bigger. Can't really tell yet what I'll end up with.
This one is probably getting on 30 years old.

What size pot is the mother plant in? Curious how big a 30 year old plant would be. I wonder about some of my rescues. I have a few of the ones you don't like that get tall. Sue

Hi sue that inner size of the pot is 8.5"

Here is the MG 84.807 Copiapoa goldii, for anyone keeping track. Nice looking little plant but I'm not ready to reassign this one with confidence.

I missed out on the festivities in Riverside but the big Pachycereus planting went well thankfully.
Now with all this new found space, sort of, that arrived from removing the rock garden during the move out of the Pachy from my yard, I went for another cold frame build project.
Here's the middle stages
I'll need to take a pic of the finished product after I fill it up. My game plan for organizing is moving in baby steps.
But here's a cactus pic of the big Copiapoa solaris that I just transplanted this summer. It keeps growing, but no flowers. And finally, a really good illustration of why some grafts don't take. This is a cross section of a piece of Trichocereus with Espostoa utcubambensis that I'd grafted onto but found it failing. Look for the center circle within the circle. It must have slipped during the initial rubber band attachment and caused the vascular bundles to, what, eclipse? rather than properly overlap. Always overlap the bundles, kids, it's the key to a successful graft.

Hi DW !

I hope You don’t mind Me asking…. But I notice from Your Solaris pic that they all look different.
Are there different ones ? I hope You can explain it please.
I am a new Copiapoa collector, so I am trying to learn.

Thank You !