Hi There,

I have been growing Peyotes and San Pedros, for about 15 years. The first ten years i would be very unsuccesfull because the climate i live in is simply not very good cactus climate.

Since about 5 years however my succerate has gone way up and i manage to keep most of the seedlings alive throught their first year, after which they become less fragile and will not die as easy.

Although my Trichocereuses do quite well, my peyotes al seem to eventually grow a hard yellowy skin and i have no idea why this is happening. Does anyone have this happening to their peyotes.

I´ve talked about this with a peyote grower and seller in Amsterdam who sais she has the same problem. She also had no idea why it would happen, the only thing she could think of was that it might happen to peyotes who had been sprayed (with water) while in the sun.

I will post pictures later on when i´m home.

Pleases help. I have many peyotes and it happens to all. I´ve changed their placement .. water regime .. etc etc .. any other variables i could think of. But it happens nonetheless. I really would like to correct whatever im doing wrong, especially now that peyote has ended up on the red list.

My Tricocereuses are doing fine. They grow relatively slow here, but they do grow.

pls post pictures- especially close ups of the skin
peyos are very easily damaged by mites/thrips/ etc. and damage often goes untreated

This is 3 of them.

Notice that in the middle it will continue to grow and stay green.

Looks like spider mites

Are you sure you have the right soil for your Lophophora? I mean, look at the soil of their natural habitat.

http://www.cactusconservation.org/CCI/img/sr.jpg

I hope a cacti expert can confirm this, but you want mineral soil without humus content for your Lophophoras.

Which should look like this:

http://www.kakteenshop.l...ora_mineralisch_650.jpg
http://www.kakteenshop.l...ra_williamsii_2_600.jpg
http://www.koehres-kaktu...%20williamsii.-.-.02.jpg

I think incorrect soil is my most likely bet. I give them same soil as my trichocereuses and they like lots of organic matter.

Thanks, i will immediately start looking for better soil and repot them asap.

I don't think its mite. But is there any way for me to check that ? There definately no tiny insects walking around on them.

edit:
i found this link. http://lophophora.blogsp...or-cactus-soil-mix.html
that should help.

Let's wait for dg's opinion. I'm no expert, it's just the soil which strikes me wrong.

Yes i agree the soil looks completely wrong, i can't believe i didn't think of that.

I had sort of settled with the thought that Peyotes simply don't like the climate here. But the guy from the link i posted in the previous post, lives in Denmark.

definitely mite or other tiny sap sucker damage
and soil w/too much organic matter cant help. indoors you really need a mineral based soil like pumice/perlite/rocks/etc


spray with methanol or other cacti safe(non oil) spray 2-3 times a week for a few weeks to get rid of the pests

Thanks so much, i never would have discovered this.

I´ve canged their soil to rocky stony baked clay and sand and perlite.

For the spraying, could i also use ipropanol or 96% alcohol ? I don´t have any methanol or ethanol at hand.

Should i spray them with the pure product or should i add water to the spraybotle ?

Thanks again. Im really happy i can save my peyotes. I feel a little guilty about the mistreatment so far though. But i will change my ways.

Yeah, I agree with DG that it's bug damage. Good luck with treating them my friend. I'm fighting off some thrips at the moment.

i usually dilute straight metho 50-50 with water
but others i know dont dilute it.

yes other alcohols work including ipa

(Confirm you have mites before spraying at all. The damage could be something else entirely. Or you may have had mites but now they're gone. Spider mites can be seen with the naked eye, pale beige dots and usually quite prolific by the time you notice damage, but easier to ID with a lens. Other mites may be smaller and almost impossible to see without a lens, but unmistakable with one.

Mites can be killed by all sorts of sprays although they can develop resistance very quickly so be prepared to try a different one. I don't know if you have systemic miticides available to you. Here we don't and it is necessary to spray several times a week or two apart to get good control of successive generations.

Any spray risks damaging the plant. Keep it out of the sun for a few days afterwards. Maybe just spray one and see if anything terrible happens. Often, existing damage will be further desiccated by the spray and suddenly appear much worse. The scarring won't every be cured, but on this plant it will disappear towards the base of the plant surprisingly quickly.)

()this is copied from cactiguide.com- fyi-mites dont develop resistance to alcohols
hxxp://cactiguide.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=19239

ps- i dont recommend systemic bug killers on any plant. let alone one that might be consumed at some point

Yes will do only one or two peyotes to begin with and see what happens.

Hopefull the upgraded soil will allow them to better protect themselves also.

I´ve lost a lot of seedlings to this issue and had actually stopped planting new peyote seeds all together.

Time will tell if things will change for the better.

I use this for my Calea plants:



Could work with cacti as well.

Cool, will check that out. I have 2 caleas growing in my growtent together with mimosa, psychotria and 2 baby caapis. The calea were attacked by lice, i imagine this would work well against lice as well.

Thanks.

Oh, I'm sure you and your plants will love this substance. The Caleas are somehow a magnet for spider mites and Azadirachtin is an effective weapon against them. The upside of Azadirachtin is also it's downside. It's weak, so you need to spray often. But if you want to consume your plants, it's good to have some mild and biodegradable pesticide at hand.

Edit: Here is an interesting FAQ: http://www.parryamerica.com/faq.htm
You can even spray bees with it in a beneficial way.

Thats interesting as well as i am currently studying to become a beekeeper. Starting next spring i will hope to start with my first colony.

I am however studying to become biodynamical beekeeper and they aim to not fight bee disease at all but rather let the bees learn how to survive by themselves. The idea being that any human interference basically makes the bees weaker.

Good luck with that. We certainly need more healthy bees. I was planning to sow some bee-meadows next year

Excellent, thats what the bees need most. More flowers all season long. Especially the really early spring flowers.

And less pesticides ofcourse. But a lot of beekeepers think that less flowering plants and less diversity in those plants is one of the biggest problems for the bees. So every flower helps !

main active from neem
be sure not to use any Azadirachtin product mixed w/oils- cact dont like oils too much as a general rule.
although i've used neem extract before when i shaded the plants in quarantine for a week or two.

still recomend the alcohols for quick and safe treatment.

you must repeat to kill eggs with any product. Azadirachtin is not a weak miticide