A small collection: 2015 and beyond

[Steve Johnson]

The teaser I mentioned at the end of Part 10 shall now be revealed, and it's a cactus coming...

From somewhere in Orange County CA (November 2013)

• Rebutia heliosa -- link from 2018 review Part 7

First photo on 12/1/13:



Easy to remember when I received the plant -- a few days before Thanksgiving. This was an eBay purchase, although I forgot to archive the order and I can't remember the name of the nursery. It doesn't matter where the heliosa came from, and what we're about to see is all that counts.

The heliosa's first 2 summers under my care on 9/21/14 and 9/20/15:




What happened next is pretty amazing -- 9/24/16 and 10/13/19:





My only complaint -- nasty-looking stuff getting on the spines. I don't know what it is, but not life-threatening plus it does come and go.

The heliosa has been a reliable bloomer ever since it favored me with flowers in spring 2016, although last year's flower production was a bit disappointing. The plant more than made up for it this year -- a healthy crop of buds on 6/5 and 6/6:



The flush beginning on 6/11...



...builds up to this a day later:



Give it one more day, and here's the heliosa's best display ever:




As new pups keep coming in, the pot is looking crowded, so I may need to give the plant a bigger pot next year. Is that a problem? If so, it's a nice problem to have!

A small collection meant that I could only go on a small holiday buying spree in 2013, which really began with the heliosa. It continued with the 2 Epithelanthas from Mesa Garden, and the spree's main event brings us to...

More cacti from Miles' To Go

• Cumarinia odorata -- link from 2018 review Part 5

First photo on `12/23/13:



I was pleasantly surprised to find that Cumarinia isn't shy about offsetting -- the parent plant showing pups on the its west-facing side (9/21/14 and 9/20/15):



Same dates on the east-facing side:



Now we'll see what those west-facing pups are up to on 3/14/15 and 10/6/19:



Nice! What would be even nicer is seeing new pups, although I had to wait a few years for that -- patience being rewarded on 10/21/18 and 10/6/19:



An aerial view on 9/21/14 and 10/6/19:



Cumarinia is self-fertile -- being a prolific bloomer, lots of flowers turn into lots of fruits that turn into an ooey-gooey mess when you harvest the seeds. The trick is to give the fruits a good long time to dry up, which will make seed extraction easier. The flowers themselves aren't much to look at live and in person, but photos up close might tell us a different story -- one of the pups in bloom on 6/22/20:




Something I didn't notice until I reviewed that "helicopter shot", so let's zoom in:



Yep, those are 2 brand-new pups on the right!

Cumarinia odorata certainly has its charms, but there is a downside -- those fishhook spines can grab you, so you'll need to be careful about not ripping them off when you handle the plant.

• Stenocactus lloydii -- link from 2018 review Part 15

First photo on 12/23/13:



Spanning 5 years of excellent growth on 9/20/14 and 10/12/19:



I don't have any benchmark views from above prior to 2016, so we'll use this one on 9/17/16 (left):



A side view of the lloydii spines and all on 10/12/19:



Didn't have the chance to post the following pics for my 2020 beginning-of-summer review, so we'll take care of that now -- flowers on 2/24 and a vibrantly active growth point on 6/27:



S. lloydii is one of the most eye-catching Stenos you'll ever see, although Miles' To Go seems to be the only place where we can find them. If you'd like to get a lloydii for your collection, you're in luck -- Miles Anderson has them in stock again.

• Mammillaria perezdelarosae ssp. perezdelarosae -- link from 2018 review Part 10

First photo on 12/23/13:



What a gem, and a relatively fast grower too -- 6/28 and 9/21/14, followed by the end of its next summer on 9/20/15:



The perezdelarosae needed a change from "dirty" mineral mix to clean mix -- same pot with a dose of clean mineral mix on 5/15/16, and the results at the end of another summer on 9/29/17:



Ah, yes -- the "leaning tower of Mammillaria" begins, and I think that burst of new growth in 2017 must've been due to the clean mix. The perezdelarosae as it keeps getting longer and more recumbent -- 10/21/18 and 10/13/19:



Wow, this is beyond anything I could've imagined when I first got the plant! Moving ahead to 2020, the following pic should give you a chuckle -- the perezdelarosae at the end of its long winter's nap on 3/29:



Sleeping right over my Ario fissuratus -- good thing too, because the Ario is the only cactus in my collection that's low enough to the ground to stay where it is. Okay, time to wake up (6/12):




These photos back up my contention that the perezdelarosae is thirsty enough to want watering every 10 days during summer, so I've updated the summertime schedule accordingly. Then we'll get to see if the plant stands up more by the end of this one.

I have one more item in Mr. Anderson's holiday package to show you, but we'll save it for Part 12.

[TimN]

Great plants. I really like the before and after comparison. We have a lot of the same plants! I got rid of my Cumarinias when I did the Great Purge. It was very grabby with those spines!

[Carpkel]

Nice age progression of your plants. It's nice to see pictures of the plant as it matures.

[mikethecactusguy]

It's nice collection and more amazing since the space they are in is so limited.

[Steve Johnson]

Before we get to it, I just wanted to thank those of you who've been responding -- your compliments mean more to me than you might know!

When I discovered Miles' To Go through the forum way back in 2012, something I appreciated right from the start was the fact that Miles Anderson includes photos of all the plants he sells through his online nursery. You'll never be disappointed by what he sends your way, and sometimes it'll be even better than what you expected. That was certainly the case when Miles really outdid himself fulfilling the last item I had for him on my pre-Christmas wish list. As I briefly eluded to at the end of Part 11, we'll lead off today's presentation with this...

• Discocactus buenekeri -- link from 2018 review Part 15

First photo on 12/22/13:



If you follow that link and review the photos from 2018, you'll see that the buenekeri's "chief" pup started growing a cephalium while the parent stem's cephalium was being overwhelmed by constantly-growing pups. Now for an update -- we'll use the 10/21/18 pic as a "before" and match it up with an "after" from 10/13/19:




A bird's-eye view, and the offsetting is unbelievable -- 10/8/17 and 10/6/19:



Same dates as we get a closer look at the "chief" pup:



The buenekeri's east-facing side on 10/21/18 and 10/13/19:



Since all of the new cephalium action is taking place on the "chief" pup, we'll see what it's been up to recently -- 10/13/19 and 4/2/20:



Don't know about you, but I find the whole thing incredibly fascinating. The buenekeri hasn't flowered much (once in 2014, 3 times in 2015 and once in 2018), but with the "chief" pup's cephalium actively growing, I hope to see a bloom there next month. Then again, the plant has been surprising me from the moment it started getting busy in 2014, so perhaps I'll have the chance to enjoy a repeat performance of the night-blooming magic I witnessed 5 years ago. Even if flowers don't happen (or I can't get the occasion on camera), we'll see the buenekeri again in my next end-of-summer review as the fascination continues.

My 2013 holiday buying spree finally came to an end on December 30 when I received the following plant...

From Tee Dee Cacti (Lakeport CA)

• Geohintonia mexicana -- link from 2018 review (Conclusion)

First photo on 3/18/14:



Spanning 3 years of growth on 9/24/16, 9/23/17, 9/29/18, and 10/5/19:




The view from above on 9/21/14 and 10/5/19:



Now we'll do a rib count -- 13 ribs in 2014, and 5 years later we have 18. Pretty good, isn't it? Haven't a clue about the Geohintonia's age, but my guess is that it's about 4-5 years away from being mature enough to bloom. For this longtime collector, flowers have always been a secondary consideration in terms of the cacti I choose, so I'll be happy just watching it grow more over time.

Only 3 acquisitions in 2014 as we move forward. First up, a cactus...

From Planta Seca (Alamo, CA)

• Turbinicarpus pseudopectinatus -- link from 2018 review Part 14

First photo on 2/23/14:



Showing slow, but steady growth going from 9/21/14 to 10/6/19:




After giving me a beautiful ready-made flower in 2014, the pseudopectinatus turned out to be a reluctant bloomer -- setting buds that aborted in '15, going from bud to bloom in February '16, more aborted buds in '17 and '18, and finally producing a flower in the early spring of '19. Perhaps we'll get lucky again as the new year gave us a promising start on 1/5/20:



Nope, that's as far as those buds went when the pseudopectinatus contented itself by growing after its roots woke up in the spring. Oh, well -- if you'd like to see the plant's most recent bloom, you can find the pics in my 2019 winter/spring flower review here.

From C and D Plants

• Frailea grahliana -- link from 2018 review Part 9

First photo on 3/18/14:



F. grahliana is the most prolific of the offsetting Fraileas, and like I said in my 2018 review, I was hoping that moving the plant into a bigger pot would encourage it to fill the pot with more pups. I also said "eventually", and the grahliana was on its way to obliging, so we'll compare the 10/6/18 photos I posted in that link (left) with the view exactly 1 year later:




In a sea of red skin, here's a pup displaying lovely dark green and purple (8/24/19):



That was the day when the grahliana went from bud to bloom:



A closeup of the flower:



Now we'll zoom back to include my other Frailea on the upper left:



The F. castanea and Mamm theresae will be coming up for review soon. In the meantime, a couple of observations. First -- both Fraileas go straight from buds to seed pods, but at least the grahliana will flower every once in awhile. It makes a whole lot of seeds too! And second -- while I was disappointed by the lack of new pups last year, the grahliana is making up for it. With a little over two months of summer left, I'll post new before-and-after pics of the plant in my 2020 review.

A nice way to "bookend" this presentation -- another cactus...

From Miles' To Go

• Rebutia pygmaea -- link from 2018 review Part 7

First photo on 10/19/14:



The pygmaea slowly lost its Arizona suntan while it picked up a good amount of new growth over the course of 5 years (10/13/19):




Going from Miles' soil-based mix to my soil-less mix, the difference in the plant's form and spination is really quite striking. While I do love the way it looks, there is a downside -- my area isn't hot enough for the pygmaea to maintain its pretty purple suntanned highlights. If we can't get the purple, howzabout orange instead?

Okay, sometimes flower colors do factor into looking for a species I'd like to collect. In this case, pygmaea was an obvious choice when I saw them in stock at the M2G website. The plant gave us an eyeful this spring, starting with buds on 5/8 and 1 bud opening up on 5/17:



Missed the first couple of wide-open blooms, but we're not gonna let this one get away (5/21):



A "twofer" on 5/31:



The next day, with and without the twinwall light diffuser:



We'll get a closer look at those very attractive salmon-orange blooms:



There's a little something extra in the righthand frame -- yep, a seed pod above the flower.

We have 51 species covered so far, and the magic number getting this review to the finish line is 13. Since 4 of them represent the last round of cacti coming from Miles Anderson, their number will be coming up next in Part -- you guessed it -- 13.

[mikethecactusguy]

It always amazes me at how deep and extensive the roots can be with these small cactus.

[MikeInOz]

I had a perezdelarosae that stretched like that though not quite as bad! I cut off the top and rooted it, threw away the middle bit and the rest has now formed a beautiful group. It's in bud as we speak. I'll post a pic when it opens - assuming we actually get some sun. This has been the darkest wettest coldest winter for at least 10 years!!

[Steve Johnson]

As promised, today's presentation covers the last round of cacti coming...

From Miles' To Go (May 2015, August 2016, and July 2017)

• Mammillaria theresae -- link from 2018 review Part 11

First photo on 5/16/15:



Spanning 4 years of growth on 9/19/15 and 10/6/19:




The theresae with a flower of yesteryear on 8/10/19:




This beautiful Mamm did a little more than just bloom in 2020, and I think you'll enjoy seeing the latest on what the plant has been up to.

• Echinocereus viridiflorus ssp. canus -- link from 2018 review Part 6

First photo on 8/27/16:



9/17/17 and 10/21/18, followed by a season of growth on 4/14 and 10/13/19:




Uncle rubispinus standing next to his crazy nephew:



Crazy nephew has been doing quite well this year, and you'll see him again too.

• Eriosyce napina ssp. lembckei var. duripulpa -- link from 2018 review Part 3

First photo on 8/27/16:



Like my other 2 Thelocephalas (known these days as E. napina and odieri), the duripulpa needs a good stretch of heat to initiate watering, and around here it's usually mid- to late-May. I'll demonstrate with this 4-panel series on 10/1/17, 10/7/18, a very thirsty duripulpa still waiting for its first deep drench of the year on 4/28/19, and the end of that summer on 10/6:




The view from above on 8/27/16 and 10/6/19:



I posted them last year, but these photos are worth another look -- going from bud to bloom on 4/13, 4/28, and 5/2/19:



What a difference a day makes:

• Frailea castanea -- link from 2018 review Part 9

First photo on 7/8/17:



The bud was set in the extreme heat of Arizona, so that must've been good enough to produce my first (and so far only) castanea flower. From bud to bloom on 7/8, 7/22, and 7/23/17:





Since then, the plant has been going straight from buds to seed pods. IMO Frailea flowers aren't much to look at anyway, but it is fun to watch the castanea go from setting fuzzy little red clown-nose buds as they slowly turn from brown to green and get bigger, ending up as surprisingly big pods that'll sometimes dehisc their seeds in a spectacular fashion. Another little demonstration for you -- 10/1/17, with a seed pod in the "green" stage on 10/7/18, at the end of its winter shriveling on 3/30/19, and a nice end to its summer 6 months later:




Not sure why, but the castanea attracts a lot of dust, so I'll give it a spritz right before I get out the camera. I'm sure that the species gets plenty dusty in the wild, so I may give y'all a shot of my castanea "au naturel" sometime in the future.

Pot-sowing experiment #2

Experiment #1 involved my Epithelantha micromeris, and the result was a success with 3 lovely micromeris seedlings continuing to grow 6 years after they sprouted. (Still in the same pot with the parent, by the way.) Fraileas have a lifespan of only 10-15 years, so I wanted to try the same thing with the castanea, hoping that a new generation of castaneas would be there to soldier on after the parent plant eventually dies. A promising start here on 6/9 and 10/12/19:



A few of the seedlings germinated too late in the summer to do any good, but I thought that the brown seedling could be far enough along to make it through winter. And unfortunately, it didn't survive. What did I do with the micromeris seedlings? Now I remember -- just a touch of water around their roots every 2 weeks or so in fall and winter. That was taking a chance on the possibility of rot for the parent plant, although it turned out to be no worry at all. I haven't given up on experiment #2, so learning from what I saw last year, I'll dig seeds down right around the parent castanea's base -- not too deep! -- and wait for germination as it gets regular watering over the course of next year's growing season. Should I be lucky enough to find seedlings again, I'll follow the same routine of fall and winter sips that got the micromeris seedlings through their first winter. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again...

The goal is to complete this review before my big photo shoot in preparation for the next one. And we might just make it.

[Steve Johnson]

First, the bad news...

Copiapoa laui in trouble

Last month was unusually hot here in Casa de Jefferson Park, and in the 20 years I've been living here, mid-August was the first time when I saw daytime highs in the 102-105 degree range for 7 straight days. A bedsheet I was happy to "sacrifice" during a heatwave last fall sure came in handy, and up it went to cover the plant bench again. My local NWS forecast was for a high of 105 on Saturday, and 106 yesterday, so I was prepared when the bedsheet went up yet again Friday night. Here's what I saw Saturday morning:



My Copiapoa tenuissima is the only cactus that's shown itself to be scorch-prone during heatwaves, and the shade board under the top shelf is there to protect it in the middle of the day. Usually the mornings aren't that hot, but it wasn't the case this time -- not even 10:30 a.m., and the high was already 96. Half of the plant was under the shade board, but the other half was still in full sun. The 40% shade cloth wouldn't be enough, so a piece of paper on the east-facing side of the plant did the trick. Too late to prevent sunscorch? Luckily not, although when I took that photo at 11:30, I wasn't thrilled to see what was still in full sun as the heat kept going up. Sitting next to the tenuissima, here's what I really didn't want to see:



Yep, that's a laui in trouble. The spines on pup #1 were completely brown -- definitely not normal. When I gave it a gentle squeeze, it turned to mush. Pup #2 had a patch of brown spines, and it turned to mush too. When I gave pup #3 a gentle squeeze, it oozed water and took out the spines, so I'm sure it's a goner. All 3 pups were fine when I looked the collection over Friday night -- what caused this to happen Saturday morning? The only thing I can think of was that the laui was getting sun when temps were in the low 90s, and it overheated the pups which suddenly died. Why didn't it affect the rest of the plant? Haven't a clue, although I should consider myself fortunate that the parent stem and the rest of the pups seem to be okay and growing.

Clearly, the east-facing side of the plant bench needed protection. For that, I happily "sacrificed" a pillowcase from last fall:



If I had enough foresight to put the pillowcase up Friday night, the laui wouldn't be in trouble at all, but extreme heat in the early morning was something I hadn't seen before. If (or more likely when) there's even a chance that I'll see these conditions in the immediate forecast again, I'll know exactly what to do:



By the way, the "ghost" you see on the plant table is a Cephalocereus senilis that got badly scorched in the fall heatwave I just mentioned. There's a lot more to the story which began here, and I'll post a 1-year follow-up on the Sick Cacti forum in November. Now back to the laui...

Yesterday hit a record-shattering high of 115, and the heat dried pup #s 1 and 2 enough for removal with tweezers yesterday afternoon:



I'll need to let pup #3 dry up before I remove it. Not sure what to do about the hole it'll leave behind, but this is something I'll figure out later. In the meantime, at least I know what looks normal and what doesn't spine-wise -- all I can do is watch, wait, and hope that burnt-looking brown spines don't appear elsewhere on the plant.

The good news on Friday came before the bad, and it was really good...

Discocactus buenekeri in bloom!

After the parent stem produced a half-hearted flower in 2018, the "chief" pup and its marvelous cephalium really came through:



Buds during the day and blooms at night:




We'll zoom back and view the entire plant with its night-blooming magic in progress:




Dying in the light of the following morning, and those flowers are still beautiful:



The parent stem is showing us all kinds of crazy, and it all started way back in 2015. We'll investigate this a bit further in my 2020 review.

The 115-degree heat brought out a couple of wide-open flowers, and a nice way to end this good news/bad news presentation. C. tenuissima:




Gymnocalycium stenopleurum:




Regarding the 2019 review, we're down to 9 species, and I think 2 or 3 more installments should be sufficient to wrap things up there. Stay tuned, my friends!

[bartab]

Oh my. This heat is getting old. Sorry you have had trouble with it. Up north it hit 108 yesterday and 111 today and hopefully cooling down starting tomorrow. I was going to put up another layer of shade cloth under my 40%, but the smoke in the air is having the same affect. With the low here tonight being in the mid 60's I was thinking about watering some things that were overdue. Especially some plants in smaller pots. They hit their dry weight a few days ago. Yes, I started weighing some of them before watering. Is it bad to water now or should I wait till it gets back to normal nice weather on Wednesday night or Thursday.

[Steve Johnson]

Oh my. This heat is getting old...Is it bad to water now or should I wait till it gets back to normal nice weather on Wednesday night or Thursday.

Right there with you on both counts. I had a bunch of cacti due for watering Saturday night, but I didn't dare because my local forecast showed an overnight low of 80 -- that's another first (one I could live without again, by the way), and lack of direct experience with summertime dormancy puts me at a disadvantage. A few numbers might help for guidance, so here's what my NWS 3-day history had to say about the overnight lows during this miserably hot weekend:

Saturday night at midnight, 81. Yesterday morning -- 78 at 4 a.m., 77 5-7 a.m. (my outdoor thermometer bottomed out at 76), 83 at 8 a.m. Last night at midnight, 81. This morning -- 78 at 5 a.m., 77 6-7 a.m. (my outdoor thermometer bottomed out at 74. Ooh, frosty! ), then the temps went back up from there hitting a high of 91. Okay, so I got a little bit of a break today. My forecast shows an overnight low of 68, and while I could water the overdue cacti tonight, my gut instinct is to be better safe than sorry, and wait for tomorrow night. Seriously, a delay of 2 or 3 days won't bother them.

Now check out the NWS 3-day history for Danville:

https://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getob ... m=72&raw=0

Those numbers have summertime dormancy written all over it. The overnight low's lowest temperature always takes place an hour or two before dawn, so I wouldn't trust your forecast's overnight low of 74 for watering yet. The next forecast low of 62 looks promising, so that might be okay for watering tomorrow night, but I'd be really hesitant to say yes. "Better safe than sorry" goes with watering rule #1 -- when in doubt, don't. So long story short, I'd recommend that you water your cacti on Wednesday night or Thursday night.

[One Windowsill]

Going back a while, how smelly are Cumarinia odorata flowers? Or did you not want to risk your nose near those fishhooks?

[Steve Johnson]

Going back a while, how smelly are Cumarinia odorata flowers? Or did you not want to risk your nose near those fishhooks?

I don't pick up any sort of aroma from those flowers, so I'm not sure why it's called "odorata". However, lifelong dust and pollen allergies don't do my sense of smell any favors, and the flowers may be slightly smelly for people with keener noses.

[One Windowsill]

Thanks.

I would recommend a HEPA air filter for the bedroom and any other room you use a lot. It as made my life so much better.

[mikethecactusguy]

Amazing what you have done in such a small area. Inspirational.
Thanks
Mike M