Wow, my 6th annual already! Since there may be a "tune-in" factor for newer members who aren't familiar with my work, I'd like to give you some background that'll set the table on how I got from there to here...
"There" began in 1970, when I fell in love with cacti at the tender age of 12. So much I didn't know in my first 21 years of collecting, although truth be told, there wasn't much in the way of good advice coming from the local cactus & succulent community back then. Circumstances forced me out of the hobby in 1991, but more fortunate ones got me back in 20 years later. Starting from scratch, my go-to place turned out to be the California Cactus Center in Pasadena. I did some business with the CCC when it was Maleenee Desert Gallery in the '80s, and I was thrilled to know that one of my old c&s nurseries is still going. Time for serious cactus shopping, as the CCC set me up with a nice group to build the new collection in June and July 2011. Great, but what should I grow the cacti in? Here's a sample of what the CCC had to offer:
Being used to the soil-based mixes I knew from my younger days, the CCC's mix seemed to be fine. Although the good folks there did recommend leaning it out with pumice, I was still too much of a newbie to figure out how lean it should be. This brings us to "here".
I instinctively felt that I was doing something wrong. What that something might be, I hadn't a clue. Then I discovered the CactiGuide forum in November 2011, and that's when my true learning started. Darryl Craig of CoronaCactus Nursery was still active on the forum then -- I give him endless amounts of credit for:
1. Recommending a pure mineral mix of pumice and decomposed granite (DG). I'll expand on this point in a moment.
2. Turning me on to Dyna Gro All-Pro 7-7-7, it's the only fertilizer I'll use. However, we can only buy it by the gallon, so that may be a bit expensive for some of you. Dyna Gro sells a 7-8-6 (called Orchid-Pro) in smaller quantities, and with the same excellent profile of minor and micronutrients we'll find in the 7-7-7. I highly recommend either fert. Dilute 1/2 teaspoon per gallon of water.
DG is about 60% "play sand" fines that need to be sifted out and thrown away...
...yielding about 40% usable as granite gravel:
When I started using the pumice-DG mix, I made the mistake of thinking that dry-sifting was sufficient. When you look at the above photo, it may not seem like much of a problem. Negatory, my friends -- there was still too much of the "play sand" clinging to the gravel. After repeated waterings, the residual fines settled down in the pots and turned into a root-clogging mess. The solution (and it's an easy one),
always rinse mineral gravels thoroughly before use. Here's an example of the mix "dirty" and clean:
Starting in 2015, I spent the better part of 2 years gradually replacing the "dirty" mineral mix with clean mix. While I don't want to belabor the subject too much, this'll come up when we review the cacti that have benefited the most from the cleanup. A number of people do well growing their cacti in straight pumice -- the addition of granite gravel is purely optional. My collection is outdoors 24/7/365, and I wasn't thrilled with the idea of having small pots tip over in the wind (same problem Darryl has out in Corona), so for me it's a 3-2 ratio of pumice to granite. (Granite is granite -- there's nothing magical about DG. Crushed granite poultry grit does the same job, easily available online or at livestock supply stores.)
Straight pumice and pumice-granite gravel mix have a couple of major advantages over soil-based mixes. First, pumice is the ideal mineral for cacti because it has a unique combination of open porosity and good water retention. (IMO
way better than Perlite or Vermiculite, by the way.) And second, plenty of airspaces around the grains provide excellent aeration for optimal root growth. If you compare the root systems of cacti being grown in mineral mix with those growing in soil-based mixes, you'd be pretty impressed by the difference. With that said, a soil-less approach won't work for certain cactus species. I have a few of those, so as the review unfolds, I'll point them out and give you the "recipes" I'm using.
When we grow cacti in pure mineral mix, they'll need to be fertilized every time they're watered in the growing season. Which brings me to another important topic -- water quality. If you water your plants from the tap or a well, you'll be dealing with hard water. This can be a
big problem for the long-term health of all plants (not just cacti!) because mineral build-up in the mix slowly robs their roots of the ability to efficiently take up water and nutrients. (Calcium bicarbonate is the primary culprit in tap water.) Can't remember where I found it, but an article by Elton Roberts in the Cactus & Succulent Society Journal was a major revelation that led me to acidifying my tap water in early 2012 -- and I've been doing it ever since. I posted a pretty good tutorial on acidification last year, and you can find it
here.
Okay, the table is now set, so let's get the party started with...
The 2011 cacti
When I went about building a new collection, favorite species from the old one were in the back of my mind when it was time for cactus shopping. And before I got reacquainted with the CCC, the humblest of beginnings happened to be 2 plants I found at a local Armstrong Garden Center in May of that year:
That's Espostoa lanata on the left, and Mammillaria spinossissima on the right. Both are old favorites -- in fact, the famous "red-headed Irishman" was one of the cacti that first got me into the hobby 47 years ago. From the end of summer, here's the most recent pic of the Irishman along with 2 other cacti you'll see a bit later:
2 years of growth -- 9/19/15 and 9/17/17:
Wow, the Irishman sure is big, isn't he? Next, we'll check in on the Espostoa:
A young "old lady of Peru" aging quite gracefully -- 10/12/13, 9/20/15, 9/17/16, and 10/8/17:
The old lady started growing a fuzzy-wuzzy little something in April, so let's investigate -- 4/30 and 10/8:
What could it be? Yuppers, that's a new stem -- what a pleasant surprise!
The Gymnocalycium ochoterenae vatteri you saw next to the Espostoa was one of my finds from the California Cactus Center in June 2011, which is when the collection really got going. At the end of its first summer under my care (such as it was):
Now that the vatteri has 6 more summers under its belt, we'll review this before-and-after on 9/20/15 and 9/17/17:
The view from above, what the plant's active growth point looks like when it's not covered with flowers:
Before I was able to take that shot, here's another one you might prefer (9/5):
Going back over to the red-headed Irishman's immediate neighborhood, you'll notice 2 other old favorites I found at the CCC, so next up we'll look at...
Tephrocactus articulatus papyracanthus, AKA the famous "paper-spine". It was the only plant that struggled in pure mineral mix, showing no signs of new growth at all in 2012. When I posted an inquiry seeking advice on the forum, one of our most experienced members suggested that Tephros may not do well in a soil-less mix given their very fine root systems. Sure enough, he was right, and when I gave the paper-spine a good dose of soil in the mix, 2013 was the year when it started growing new segments. Holding onto that big bag of mix from the CCC came in handy -- all I had to do was pull out the big chunks of tree bark and rocks, and it was perfectly suitable as the soil component for a 50/50 soil/pumice mix. Things were getting better and better in 2014, as the plant was on track for producing 2 new segments per year -- our "high water" mark (so to speak) on 9/17/16:
Tephros are known for dropping segments, their #1 method of self-propagation. Great for increasing the number of plants, but annoying when the idea is to keep yours intact. I don't water my Tephros at all during winter, getting shriveled and pruney -- if they could talk, they'd be saying "oh no, drought!" About a week after I gave the paper-spine its first deep drink of 2017, it responded with "drought's over, time to propagate!" (3/29):
As we see here, one branch dropped 2 segments. Then the other branch dropped 2 more not long after that. I don't have enough space to accomodate duplicates of the same species, so I donated the dropped segments to Desert Creations in Northridge. No worries, though -- my paper-spine is great about growing new ones. This year's progress going from 4/1 and 4/29...
...to 5/13 and 5/20:
Take the "after", turn it into a "before", and we'll see the summer's result on the right (10/9):
It may have been a mistake to keep my Tephros dry over the winter, so I'll try watering them every 4 weeks this winter to see if this is enough to prevent dropping. You saw my other Tephro in front of the Espostoa, and we'll give it a more in-depth look when we get to the 2012 cacti.
Aside from ornatum (which I never cared for), Astrophytums fascinated the heck out of me as a young cactus collector. The 3 species I grew (or at least tried to) were asterias, capricorne, and myriostigma. Old favorites I wouldn't be without, and I found all 3 at the CCC. Sadly, the asterias didn't survive its first summer on the plant bench, but the other 2 were remarkably tolerant of my ignorant "old school" ways. The capricorne went through a marvelous transformation as soon as I got my act together, but I'll save the story for my next installment. We'll end today's post with myriostigma. When I went to the CCC, both the 4-ribbed and 5-ribbed kind were being offered. The 4-ribbed variety is fairly uncommon, so of course my interest in the unusual led me to choose a quadricostatum. Such a small thing it was back at the end of summer 2011:
Not so small these days -- progress going from 9/22/13 to 9/17/17:
A bird's-eye view on 3/16/13 and 9/17/17:
A prolific bloomer strutting its stuff with 2 big, beautiful flowers on 9/12:
I've shown you only a few of the plants coming home from my trips to Pasadena, so stay tuned for more heading your way soon.