CactiGuide.com

Greetings all. My first post here. Just kind of testing.
Been keeping cactus for probably over 40 years. I have 3 cacti and an aloe that are at least 70 years old.
lately I have gone crazy buying cheap cacti at the box stores,and also bought some seeds from mesa gardens.
I have also bought some more expensive ones from nurseries
My first seed "victims" are Trichocereus huascha andalgala.
To my surprise they have sprouted in about 6 days.and there a LOT of tiny green dots. They are on a heating mat and under a MARS grow light turned up about half way.
I realize most of you have already seen ziplock bags with condensation in them. But as I say, I am just kind of testing.
I will probably post more here as these seedlings live or die. But for now I am pretty happy that they sprouted.
I cooked my own cactus soil mix in a pressure cooker before potting. And am curious to see if it stays sterile.
All for now..... Fred

Ooops,I lied about my soil mix.
50% store bought cactus mix and 50% perlite

Welcome Fred. Your soil lost its sterility once you added your seeds to it. But that does not mean that is bad. You did the right thing to sterilize your soil. That will kill off damping off fungi and any weed seeds. Always a good thing to do.

Welcome FredBW It would be really interesting to see photos of your senior plants! And of course the rest of them too ( which brings me to an off topic question; is it considered wrong to start a sentence with and?

I did spray my seeds with peroxide,and let them soak a few minutes. And also after I dropped them onto the soil I sprayed it with more peroxide before closing the bag. And these seeds were pretty tiny. About the size,or maybe a little smaller than coarse black pepper. And looking into it further it looks like i should of added a little vinegar. And I will probably do that next time. And works just fine starting a sentence
Here is a picture of the old man of the Andes I just bought. I lost my lady to meningitis almost 2 years ago. She worked in a nursery. So on the 2 year anniversary of losing her I walked into where she used to work planning on buying something and this is what I walked out with. It is about 3 feet tall counting the pot I had and aunt that had cactus,and when she died my mom inherited her cacti. We lost about half from over watering. But here are 2 of the survivors,and they have to be at LEAST 70 years old. I am not sure what either one is. My aunt died about 45 years ago. The Amak my girl brought home from work one day. I thought it was some kind of Peruvian cactus,and I had been keeping it in partial shade. This summer I moved it out into full sun and it's scary how fast it is growing! Sorry,I don't know how to rotate the picture. I have probably 30 or more smaller cacti,not to mention houseplants.

This is the difference in 4 or 5 weeks of full sun.

Hi Fred,
I think your 2nd photo could be Pachycereus pringlei (Mexican Giant Cardon), and 3rd photo is Echinocactus grusonii (Golden Barrel Cactus).
The Euphorbia ammak can grow quite fast with right conditions.

BryanT wrote: ↑Sun Aug 14, 2022 1:39 pm Hi Fred,
I think your 2nd photo could be Pachycereus pringlei (Mexican Giant Cardon), and 3rd photo is Echinocactus grusonii (Golden Barrel Cactus).
The Euphorbia ammak can grow quite fast with right conditions.

Thanks for the response I had the same names on my list of what they could be. But neither of those old cacti have grown any since i can remember. The column cactus was severely root bound,which i re potted not long before the photo(2 or 3 months ago).
But as I say. It seems this might be as big as both of them get growing here in the midwest,bringing them inside for the winter.
I do have a cardon i bought from Home depot about 5 years ago,and they do look alike. But the Home depot cactus is slowly getting bigger.
If I live long enough I might find out if it overtakes the one in question.

FredBW wrote: ↑Sun Aug 14, 2022 2:16 pm Thanks for the response I had the same names on my list of what they could be. But neither of those old cacti have grown any since i can remember. The column cactus was severely root bound,which i re potted not long before the photo(2 or 3 months ago).
But as I say. It seems this might be as big as both of them get growing here in the midwest,bringing them inside for the winter.
I do have a cardon i bought from Home depot about 5 years ago,and they do look alike. But the Home depot cactus is slowly getting bigger.
If I live long enough I might find out if it overtakes the one in question.

They are quite heavy to move. If you can find a spot to keep them dry during winter, and protect from frost, should be able to leave them outdoor.

You certainly are right about them being heavy. But keeping them outside in the winter in KC is not an option.
Usually once or twice a winter it dips down to -10 Fahrenheit. That's -24 Celsius. -20 Fahrenheit is entirely possible.
If I had any brains I would move to a more forgiving climate. But this is home sweet home

Update on seedlings
It has been about 3 weeks since these have sprouted. I am looking for advice on how they are doing. To me they look like they are doing pretty good.
They are under a MARS grow light only turned up about 50%,and the light is only on 12 hours a day. From everything i read the light should be on longer. But looking at my seedlings, I kind of feel I shouldn't mess with anything. They don't look leggy to me..... yet. They are in a basement and get no other light.
I needed to add some water,so I took a picture.
The package said 100 seeds,and i didn't use anywhere near half of them. If I don't kill them I will have WAY more than I know what to do with.

It has been about 6 weeks since these sprouted. Looks like they are growing spines and already getting kind of crowded.
Nobody had any advice my last post,so I left things as they were. Except I turned up the dial on the grow light a notch ( I believe it's only 60%).
I am not planning on adding any more water as long as there is still a little bit puddling in the bottom of the bag.
I think my only mistake so far is planting too many seeds Since the first batch I have started 4 more batches of various cacti Yikes!

Still in the bag! I have 5 other batches I have started,and I have unbagged them for various reasons. These guys which are batch #1 seem fairly happy. I was going to un bag them today. But I really see no reason,except maybe the bag is hampering light. Iduno. But I'm going to leave them in there a few more weeks. They are almost 12 weeks old.

They're starting to get overcrowded, need to be repotted soon.

greenknight wrote: ↑Mon Oct 31, 2022 1:55 am They're starting to get overcrowded, need to be repotted soon.

OK. I'll get them out of the bag first and used to regular air and light.
I really have no idea what I'm going to do with that many if they live!