Gravel: it provides physical structure that holds the plant up. It has gaps in-between the particles that allows air and water to flow and for roots to grow through. Near where I live, there's a local producer of a product called expanded slate. I've recently begun using that as my gravel in my pott...

This past year I have been introduced to the concept of root trimming particularly when repotting. Apparently, the practice is standard procedure for Asian cactus growers and indeed is who I learned of it from. There's lots of good videos on youtube about it particularly of a Thai grower named Mr. B...

I've recently learned from personal experience that soil porosity is altered by root growth. What I found is that, as a cactus becomes more root bound in a pot, the soil porosity decreases dramatically. I"m repotting some small trichocereus that were in a pot and the water just would not drain ...

Ha. I immediately thought of buffering the pond, probably because I've been talking about water lilies with friends on another forum. I have two tubs in my yard where I grow lilies and fish. Cross connection in the mind. I kind of thought you might have been referring to the tub type ponds. You are...

I think he was talking about buffering his watering solution, not his pond. you are correct. Its silly to try to buffer the spring. I'm not putting the cactus plants into the pond. I'm collecting water from the pond with a bucket. The water to be buffered is in a bucket. It'll be interesting to see...

So, I just recieved the rolls of pH test paper from Fisher Scientific. I got the 3.0 to 8.0 and the 1.0 to 14.0 test paper. The brand name is Hydrion. I tested the paper using 4.5 and 10.1 buffer solutions. Obviously, I couldn't test the 3.0 to 8.0 with the 10.1 buffer solution; however, I'm very co...

I used to add it to my mixes. That was 20 years ago and I don't exactly remember details. Its similar to using an activated carbon filter to filter your drinking water- binding with chemicals you don't want in your drinking water. It was easily available in local big box hardware stores in the garde...

I remember in the past trying to sow seeds immediately from fresh harvested fruit and having low germination rates, like 1/10. That was about 20 years ago. I'm not sure what cactus it was but I can say it wasn't Hylocereus. As I will be trying to get some seeds from my other cactus such as ariocarpu...

I'm totally down for standardizing terminology- helps to reduce confusion. However, its too early in the morning for me to offer any suggestions. Imo, soil is whatever you are putting into the pot whether mineral or organic, or a mix of the two- that's your "potting soil". And we should be...

I have some seeds from Hylocereus undatus on paper towel right now. Can cactus seeds in general be sprouted straight from the fruit without any drying or should they be dried first and for how long? Anything else that ought to be done such as cleaning them and how? I have learned that cactus seeds l...

After comparing results among a number of products, the best I've found are the 17 in 1 Pool and Drinking Water Test Strips made by MedLab Diagnostics. You can buy them on Amazon. I just tried those and found that the pH test only goes as low as 6.0. Since we are trying to have an average of 5.5, i...

I believe certain red light can be a germination starter so maybe when these fruits ripen and change to red the light penetrating the fruit wall then initiates this type of germination? That indeed is a very interesting question. Perhaps a side-by-side test is in order. One humidity box with a red ...

I can't help but wonder if some of your low germination rates were due to the seeds themselves.
Maybe they were old, not handled well, exposed to some weird environmental factor in transit?

Both studies have absolutely no relevance to growing cacti in pots. All I can tell you is that a year of my lower-P fert regimen (plus TPS CalMag) and acidified water has led to substantial improvements in growth and flower production compared to where I was in 2012-2022. Trial and error plus close...

Even if the K3PO4 remains unchanged in the above equation, it needs to be indicated on the right hand side of the equation. As it is not, I'd say the equation is incomplete and unbalanced. Something's not right about it. The red flag saying "some elements only exist on one side of the reaction&...