dg, I'm very curious as to how you went about grafting that many Lophophora williamsii. Must've taken an eternity.

Sigmundfreuid, that's a beautiful specimen of Astrophytum Asterias. How old/large is it? Did you grow it from seed?

-JM

Im not sure of its age but i would give it 2.5 to 3 years if it was seed grown,i bought it from Kadas Garden,and im not sure itf it was grown from seed......
couldve been grated who knows,i payed 2 $ for it and it was 5 cm , pretty good deal.And their so nice.........

i was given a bag of ready to consume shriveled buttons from a NAC member.
i thought they had some life left, so i grafted them to pedro
they set seed
i sprouted seeds, and grafted to pereskiopsis
etc.

but yes, a labor of love

Thanks. As you can probably tell from my avatar I love those little guys. I'm currently trying to grow some Super Kubuto from seed as well as some 'typical' A. Asterias and other cacti. I'll try to find my camera and post some shots of the babies.

-JM

ok, i have a few extra cacti...
next two members to post photos of a suitable location to grow a cacti, and promise to grow the cut i send vs. consume it , will get a free trich cut of my choosing
include a short note about your current experience with cacti please

US only prefered, international is a pita

dg
edit, mods: is this ok? not sure of protocol

ok, one left

faishly: i'll pm you in a day or so.
..

like fiashly have to grow in pots and bring inside because of winter could have taken better pics too it was at night with cheap camera. The kanna and bridgesii are seed grown and I rooted the opuntia that's all my cacti/succulent experience I do have an aloe too but leave inside and have icaros seedlings,but those can't take any sun yet.

did you ever eat the fruits of those opuntias? they are delicious! (if the one you have is opuntia ficus-indica, hard to say though, and I dont know about the fruits of other opuntias)

i agree, they are tasty!!

ok, pms cometh you two

what the heck, i have two more setting here....who wants em?

no I haven't and it is ficus indica. I heard O. engelmanni and a couple others are good too samee swith cereus peruvianus fruits I would grow that if I could grow outside all year. I definitely want to try the fruits I heard they taste slightly like watermelon,or something? I got the opuntia earlier this year and it hasn't bloomed hopefully later this year. I heard you can despine and cook the pads like a vegetable too. Are all the cuts the same dg just curious?

bump,
two cuts left.....

OK, well my foray into growing cacti from seeds is not too far along but here's what I've been able to do so far:

The first pics are of some pachanoi seedlings that were planted on January 14 and hardened off about two months later. The second pic is of more seedlings from the same batch, planted at the same time, but I waited another two months to harden them off. Looks like hardening them off quickly is good with these little guys.

Here are a couple of successful grafts from my first attempts with Pereskiopsis Spathula. The one on the left is a T. Peruvianus and the second is an Echinocereus Rigidissimus. The second picture shows a non-grafted seedling planted at the same time as the grafted Peruvianus. I'm amazed at the difference in size.

Sorry for all the separate posts, but I'm not sure how to upload images inline with text quite yet...

Anyway, this is my 'grafting lab' and some pics of a more recent batch of grafts. The first is a pic of my little humidity dome. If you look close you can see that my Pereskiopsis don't appreciate the use of krazy glue. I used a super small drop to affix two specimens that didn't want to stay put and it's killed several leaves. Not sure where I read that krazy glue was OK, but I'll be avoiding it in the future.

The grafts in the foreground of the second and third pics are Ariocarpus Fissuratus and Epithelantha Micromeris, respectively. They're not ready for the cactus exhibit at the botanic gardens quite yet, but I'm proud of them.

-JM

OK, just a few more pics. Again, I'm sorry for the separate posts.

First are some seedlings.

1) Lophophora Williamsii (look close, it's in there!)
2) Astrophytum Asterias 'Super Kabuto'
3) Plain old Astrophytum Asterias (some mold is visible on the top of the soil but they seem to be OK so far)
4) Astrophytum Myriostigma (tough to see them, but there are at least four in there)

And next are some Bridgesii cuttings I got from BBB. If you ask me, they look more like Pachanoi than Bridgesii.

Finally, a pic of my entire seedling/grafting/cutting space and some out-of-control Pereskiopsis.

I know it's not much, but I hope others will see how easy this hobby can be and plant some seedlings!

-JM

jmaxton, what kind of wood chips are those, why do you use them?

Very nice collection Jmaxton .Cant wait to start growing my seeds ... My setup isnt fully ready yet , i have everything except something to cover the grow rack
since the fluoros i bought ,T5 are so powerful they give an instant headache. If anyone has any suggestions to what material i should cover my rack with(has to be cheap) ,
will be very helpful.one thing for sure is that i need to use a layer of white material for reflecting light.

Those are standard cedar chips, like the kind normally used for animal bedding. I had some gnats flying around earlier in the Spring and I read somewhere that they dislike cedar chips. FWIW, the chips didn't seem to help and most of them have now been removed. The gnats disappeared on their own after about a month, but I still keep fly paper up just to be sure they don't come back.

EDIT: As a matter of fact, I think the cedar chips were counterproductive. They prevented moisture from evaporating off of the soil which could encourage molds and bugs to take up residence.

-JM