Weird looking thingy

[Sahara]

Hi, I was wondering what this is... it looks prickly, that's about as much as I could discover about it.

[daiv]

This is it:

http://www.cactusshop.com/retail/store/ ... px?id=1470

[Sahara]

So is there another name for this one? How come you don't have C. monstrose on the website Daiv?

[daiv]

Well because it isn't a known species. Pretty much every cactus can be "monstrose". It is just a plant with irregular mutated growth. They don't come through from seeds, but must be propagated by cuttings.

[Sahara]

Cool, thanks. You learn something new every day

[daiv]

That is quite true. I've been meaning to put together a brief article on the monstrose and other mutated plants because they do come up often for ID. Not that they wouldn't keep comming up for ID, but then we could post a link to the article that would be a more organized explanation.

[CoronaCactus]

Sometimes they come with the name "Ming Thing".

[Silenus]

Well because it isn't a known species. Pretty much every cactus can be "monstrose". It is just a plant with irregular mutated growth. They don't come through from seeds, but must be propagated by cuttings.

Odd, I have heard of monstrose variations coming from seed after some amount of time.

[cactiman321]

i agree with daiv, can only be propagated by cuttings,will always produce true to species seed, but with age monstroses & crests will often revert back to original true growth charachteristics
which then means take a good fresh cut of the mutated form growth , to keep a good potted or otherwise monstrose specimen.
these are often only grown in pots as monstroses keep even really tall larger species to a maintainable size as they are very slow to grow compared to the ''true'' type of the species