CactiGuide.com

Hi folks,

these days I have learned that some of my cacti had wrong names. Now I have stumbled across another candidate: Is this really a Lobivia hertrichiana?
It has that short spines, near the crown none. The buds are black balls of wool (see 2nd picture) and it flowers in three shades of pink.
Thank you says
Nachtkrabb

it looks wonderful, it is possible that it is a echinopsis hybrid, but I am not an expert. It looks wonderful.

Likely one of its parents was hertrichiana.

This looks like L. hertrichiana to me.

Thanks, but... isn't L. hertrichiana supposed to have longer, denser spines...?
Is the colour of the flower "normal"?

Lobivia is one of the most variable genera. both flower colour and spination can often vary within a species, so making identification difficult. Also we tend to cultivate an original clone in cultivation which may not show all the variation in habitat. When new clones are imported from habitat they may look different to our original one. Plus many in cultivation may have been hybridised too.

Images will enlarge if clicked on:-

https://www.kaktusy-sukulenty-masozravk ... trichiana/

Very pretty plant, very close to hertrichiana. It may also be in some relation with cinnabarina and maybe arachnacantha.
I have one prolific bloomer with uncertain name, also combines features of some Lobivias.

Thank you, DaveW and Anttisepp, for your messages. On the kaktusy-site, there are so many plants -- some of them have a spination that looks familiar to me. The flowers of theirs & mine are similar in form, although differently coloured.
So it might be a "commingled" plant with different grandparents...? That would account for a lot...

Besides, this plant has a story: I was working with a company where I wasn't too happy. They had hired a gardener as service provider who hat put plants into the offices and took care of them on a regular basis. All plants where in a kind of aquaculture without real soil ("Semiramis"), even the cacti. The beautiful cactus in my office never flowered, although it had loads of light, and was ill with some lice. It was quite a clump, two hands full of balls.
After a couple of months I took the liberty and cut a cutling and took it home: There it got some anti-lice-bath, personal care & (as a special treat) real soil. Obviously it liked its new live, see above.
After the theft I talked to the gardener about the lice: He had been totally anaware of them. The next day, the cactus was missing. On asking he told me he had thrown it away.
I am oh so happy that I had preserved that little cutling.

N.

Yes Seramis was one of the early forms of mineral substrate and they also used to sell Seramis fertiliser, a hydroponics fertiliser that supplied all the micronutrients which plants in soil usually obtained from the soil itself. If you use a totally mineral potting mix you need a fertiliser that supplies all the trace elements. Some fertilisers sold for normal soil culture lack these since they expect the soil to supply such trace elements that are only needed in small quantities.

These days the red molar clay cat litter is its equivalent and a lot cheaper to buy from pet and other shops. In the UK its Tesco Premium Low Dust cat litter or Sophisticat or Sanicat from pet shops. But make sure it is not the cheap cat litters they also sell which are not red molar clay and unsuitable for using or adding to cactus and other succulent soils.

https://seedscactus.com/en/soils/26-ser ... 20vigorous.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z85FKC8626Q

2 nachtkrabb: Touching story. Once I had carelessness at work to tell that plants on stairs need more watering and next day I saw them thrown into garbage, it was wery sad and I still feel sorry to them. Nevertheless later I saved one zamioculcas from near death and now it's very beautiful plant.

Oh, DaiveW, the Seramis in that office wasn't used as kind of mineral soil. It was used as for papyrus plants or benjamini or something, in a pot without drainage holes, with a tube to check the water level. Then you can always water up to "MAX".... and they did!
N.