Another for ID Please?

[Tom Roach]

Was tagged as a Schmolii, please pardon fuzzy photo...

TIA!

[majcka]

Pterocactus megliolii?

[vlani]

One of those thin-stemmed Echonocerei - most likely schmolii.

[DaveW]

Flowers will prove it, but as Vlani says probably a Wilcoxia, now lumped into Echinocereus:-

http://www.cactus-art.biz/schede/ECHINO ... _SB852.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The Wilcoxia's have tuberous roots also.

[Tom Roach]

Thanks yall.
Those funny little flowers are perplexing...

[DaveW]

Hardly fully opened flowers yet, they are just woolly buds. They should continue to grow and eventually open. When fully open you should be able to see the stigma and anthers. Note the similar picture of the woolly buds on the right hand picture in the link I posted which are slightly more advanced than on your plant.

Yours is a very nice well grown plant by the way.

[Tom Roach]

Beautiful and thanks!

[Tom Roach]

Three of the flowers developed and the rest look like they just disappeared back into the plant.

Once again sorry for the fuzzy photo...

20150325_190857.jpg (51.15 KiB) Viewed 1598 times

[DaveW]

Plants will often produce more buds than they can carry, just as fruit trees often produce more fertilised fruits than the tree can take to maturity, so if they cannot bring them all to maturity will often abort the rest. Flowers confirm the previous identify.

[greenknight]

Anyway, the flowers do look like Echinocereus schmollii - though the pistils are usually more green, close enough.

[vlani]

I'd say poselgeri. It should have potato-like roots.

[Tom Roach]

Thanks! I did manage to snap a better photo of two of the flowers before they all closed up.

20150326_193154~2.jpg (60.65 KiB) Viewed 1510 times

I am curious about what kind of soil these guys like. This thing is growing in really rich what looks like regular potting soil that does not drain freely, but cacti usually prefer something different. My first temptation was to repot it in more of a cactus type soil, but it is doing so well as it is that I'm not sure how to proceed.

Glad we got it narrowed down to E. schmollii or E. poselgeri, either way it appears to be an unusual plant, though I was terrified to see that they can be susceptible to scale insects and mealy bugs.

Thanks again!

[vlani]

Soil as such actually does not matter, almost not at all. It is the whole combo of soil, pot, temperatures and watering regiment.

I found it easiest to grow my plants in mineral substrate which is just a chopped fire clay chips (sold as Turface), and add mineral fertilizer sporadically. In this type of substrate it is difficult to impossible to 'overwater' the plants, but easy to run it too dry - which is generally OK with cacti.

With more 'normal' substrates - that is more commonly seen in the pots, not that it is any better - you must follow the routine of watering moderately and letting the substrate dry completely every time before watering again. That way you can provide sufficient amount of air in the substrate at any time, especially right after you watered the plants. It is somewhat tricky, but people been doing that for a long time.

THe range of approaches to cacti 'soil' is pretty wide as you can see, so choice is yours.

As of insect pests - for anything with 6 legs use the systemic insecticides. The products that have substance called Imidaclopride in them taking care of the problem on very easy terms. Water with it twice a year and forget about insect pests.

Mites is a different story, and different treatment. Systemics for mites are too dangerous to people, you need to do a routine of spraying with regular contact-acting chemicals more often.

[greenknight]

Yep - it's just easier to avoid overwatering in a more mineral soil.

[DaveW]

The thing to remember is soil in pots does not behave like soil in open ground, therefore needs to be more porous. In open ground water usually drains quickly to lower levels below plant roots, whereas in small pots it continues to be held near them if not porous enough. That's the reason plants are grown in special potting soils and usually die fairly quickly if you use unmodified garden soil (= yard soil, USA) or even soil dug straight from habitat along with the plant when potting them. They will grow quite happily in open ground in your yard soil which if you potted them up in would kill them within a short time through not draining quickly enough.