Gallery

Meet some of the family in my greenhouse

The monster in the middle is the McNeil's cactus that snapped in half and was repotted as the stump that you see in the centre of the picture.

All the other cacti are of the same variety which I believe to be echinopsis multiplex

A general indication of health is that the darker the green, the more healthy the plant

You can clearly see babies being carried on the cactus in the middle to the right of the picture, these will be carefully removed and potted individually

The numbering system works backwards so:

4/32/6 is the 6th baby from the 32nd baby from the 4th baby from the original Mother Cactus

A lot of people ask this, assuming I am using a date as reference, but it's a unique way of identifying the heritage of the plant

Several cacti in this picture have "callous" which is where the flesh (which should be green), turns to wood and hence hardens and turns brown. There's no going back to green flesh after that, so I find that it's best to try to re-pot the plant so that the wooden part is beneath the soil

Most cacti I have have between ten and thirteen ribs, which are the flutes of the plant - I've found that generally the more mature (older) the plant - the greater number of ribs it accrues

This is what the flowers look like:

Grand flowering 8th June 2017

Owner Jeroom sent me this picture late October 2019 showing his cactus on the right and the original bamboo pot which housed his cactus. It’s grown about sixfold over a year. Impressive. Must be the Belgian air alongside his horticultural skills.

And she’s very proud of this, so here is my sister Jane’s first flower - I am sure there will be many more.