Cacti Collecting!

[Galapoheros]

Here's a fissuratus seedling, it's at this size they have often died. Other mature stuff I have does great outside. It's getting them past that fragile point that can be a little hard for me. And I planted ginger from the grocery in a pot and noticed it's about to bloom.

 

[just1moreT]

I quit the cat litter went with pumice, granit chippings ,limestone chipping/chat .perlite works floats and grows algae . Dallas bonsai has a lot potting mediums. cat litter breaks down and is nasty stuff when gets dry ,granite is nice stuff can get it in feed stores aka chicken grit I also have a Ariocarpus fissuratus v. hintonii seedling I see if I can get a pic tomorrow it's around 10 days

 

[Galapoheros]

Alright, I have "decomposed" granite but I think I should add something to it keep it from sticking like cement when it dries. I bought A. agavoides Saturday, it has a seed pod on so I'm going to try and get those going too. Also bought this Astrophytum.

 

[Driller64]

Alright, I have "decomposed" granite but I think I should add something to it keep it from sticking like cement when it dries. I bought A. agavoides Saturday, it has a seed pod on so I'm going to try and get those going too. Also bought this Astrophytum.

View attachment 130657 View attachment 130658

WHERE!?

Also watch out with the Astrophytum. They are known to die suddenly with seemingly no cause.

 

[just1moreT]

cacti

Here is my ariocarpus seedling 14 days out of seed the other seedling to left is a astrophytum been having pretty good luck on those have around 80 seedlings of hybrids and mixes from couple months to couple weeks old .other pic is succulents various stuff, lithops ,,,, and some caudex plants like that odd stuff lol some growing from seeds some bought .

 

[Galapoheros]

I left the screen off the seedling and a bird destroyed it, chased it off and then saw the damage. Another reason to put them in a safe place inside for a while at least. I still have a lot of seeds. I have a bunch of stuff in the fridge. I bought the plants at a succulent show. That's some nice stuff you have going there. I've liked the caudex stuff for a while but more recently got more fired up about it. Just this Spring I found the local Ibervillea lindheimeri and collected a lot of seeds, those are real easy. But I'm having a hard time finding I. sonorae seeds, anybody know where I can get some of those? Really though, I need a greenhouse before I get anymore stuff going. I have some rare cycads I grew from seeds also. Yeah a plant has to be kind of weird in some kind of way or I'm usually just not interested. Something I normally wouldn't be interested in that is native around here is a native flowering plant called Silphium albiflorum. It's something like a desert daisy that produces an odd, nice smelling sap. I read it's not a good "potted plant" because of the long tap root but that might only be speculation, there isn't much info about it since it's not a common plant, it's only native to the Texas hill country. I have a lot of seeds I collected. I read they usually don't germinate but I think I figured out the problem there.

 

[just1moreT]

Aw that sucks on the seedling Im keeping everything inside under a 8 bulb t5ho grow light seems to be working I'm adding on to my shop a green house in a way going have bunch Windows anyhow,, but most the weird stuff likes to grow on a window seal lol I will put stuff out once it gets bigger in years lol slow growing stuff is always the good stuff. Caudex plants are worth getting fired upped about there like P metallicas of the plant world Out of Africa plants. Web site has good buys on young stuff older stuff can get expensive

 

[The Snark]

A couple of little tidbits for you plant and especially cacti fanatics: http://www.huntington.org/WebAssets/Templates/content.aspx?id=494
http://www.rsabg.org/

 

[Galapoheros]

Yeah it's a pretty popular hobby, a lot of good info out there. Not a cactus but something many cactus/succulent collects would prob think is interesting. These are Cycas Petrea plants I grew from seed, prob pretty expensive now. Yesterday I noticed one is forming two stems. I almost let these die in the winter, just too much going on and tired of bringing all this stuff inside ..outside, inside, outside. It's a pain. What I like about this cycad, compared to something like the Sago Palm(not even related to palms other than being a plant) is that this one has a smooth trunk, the leaves easily fall off.

 

[just1moreT]

Nice looking plants there looks like a island paradise I bet they are worth a good chunk be hard to let them go raised from a seed lol. My mother has a ponytail palm she got it when I was 4 it's 40 plus year old plant and has lived a hard life ,I'm going to keep it now ,I guess she is tried of moving it around I take some pics here one day when get it home has several branches but yeah caudex plants cool as a cati and some prob live as long to

 

[Galapoheros]

No plans on selling these! I don't care much for that kind of thing, I'd rather have the "thing" than the paper money. I want to move and put these in the ground. It will prob freeze now and then where I move to so I'd like to plant them in the ground in a greenhouse. Ideally, I'd like to have a greenhouse where things are planted in the ground, as well as potted stuff. Have some simulated rock outcrops, waterfalls, a miniature volcano(shield type) and can't forget the unicorn. My main interest is getting seeds from rare plants, I don't like the idea of dead-ends. I would really like to see these produce seeds, there are male and female plants with cycas though, with these.

 

[The Snark]

We've got 3 nurseries around here offering Cycas Petrea. 2 seem to be talking out their arses but one actually has them. The BS nurseries raise various cycads and will call them anything in order to market them, mostly to rich Bangkok socialites that wouldn't know a cycad from a Euc. But the one nursery that has them is a huge affair covering maybe 20 acres and is propagating them which is a relief as the quick buck a-holes have been depredating them and bribing forestry officials if they get caught.
Good luck raising them up. I haven't the patience. I really like them as they are so unusual. Almost having 'normal' leaves and the closest to being an epiphyte of the cycad world.

 

[Galapoheros]

I forgot how much I paid for the seeds but it seems like it was around $6 each(years ago obviously), about the size of a golf ball. I also used to email the guy that collected the seeds, he was claiming he found a new species but I think it ended up being C. petrea, just a variety with leaves that looked a little different, something like that.

I may get more seeds from this that I thought;



...might be kind of cool


Just something I grew from a seed here, from a kiwi I bought at store, growing slow.

 

[Driller64]

Well here it is, the first graft I got to take :



While it was alive anyway . It got so severely infected with rust that I tried to regraft on a Pereskiopsis but I left too little on the seedling. It was an A. trigonus seedling grafted onto a Mammilaria vetula offset. After grafting I wrapped the graft with plastic wrap and put it in an area out of direct sunlight for five days. I probably should have left it for the full 7 days for it to form a better union. Well, better luck next time!

 

[Galapoheros]

I've never tried that before, well I did once without reading up on it, was real sloppy about it so it didn't work. But I've never been fired up about doing that, I may give it another try though.

 

[Driller64]

Did some grafts today on Mammillaria and Opuntia. I almost got a successful graft on Pereskiopsis but I took it out of humidity too early and it died within about four hours. So I'm just gonna give the Pereskiopsis a break and have some other cacti be my Guinea Pigs. Now all we have to do is find a way to graft tarantulas to get them to grow faster XD.

 

[Driller64]

Did some grafts today on Mammillaria and Opuntia. I almost got a successful graft on Pereskiopsis but I took it out of humidity too early and it died within about four hours. So I'm just gonna give the Pereskiopsis a break and have some other cacti be my Guinea Pigs. Now all we have to do is find a way to graft tarantulas to get them to grow faster XD.

The Opuntia graft that this post refers to worked! And is still alive and has put out quite a bit of growth. The scion is an L. williamsii seedling. I'll get a picture of it here as soon as I can.

 

[dirtmonkey]

Cool to see all the plant people

Nice to see more people into plants. I came here to see if anyone was using local plants for their vivariums and saw this.

I collect some cacti & succulents too. Probably 60-70 species and a few hybrids. All in small pots though, not much space where I'm at now.

When I had a greenhouse I had a good sized collection of epiphytic cacti. Just a few now though. Here's a fun miniature one, Hatiora epiphylloides ssp. Bradei:

Not much to show in the main part of my little cactus & succulent collection, though. It's all shrivelled up, messy, and dormant for the winter.

I've done grafting and a tiny bit of hybridizing, but nothing interesting very right now.

Edit: I've also grown tons of Sinningia, but not so much now. I do have tray of mixed seedlings I'm going to have to figure out what to do with soon though.
Vincent

 

[Medusa]

Here's a fun miniature one, Hatiora epiphylloides ssp. Bradei:

Oo, I love this! Never seen it.

I have quite a few cacti and more succulents, mostly caudex plants.

 

[Driller64]

Got this in the mail a few days ago: