Cactus peeling / spitting - don't know what to do

[rlwremo]

Hi,

We have several of these cacti, have had them for 30 years or so. This is a very recent development with 1, maybe 2 of them. I'm attaching the best photos I could get of one of them. It looks like there is a tear in the 'skin' of the cactus, where it seems to be literally peeling away. This is protected in that it is on a large table surrounded the other cactus, so we don't think there has been any action to injure it. Just not sure what it may be or what to do. Thank you in advance for any suggestions!!!!

[hegar]

Hello riwremo,
I have had a few splits of some of my cactus stems, but they were vertical and not horizonthal as is the case shown on the photos.
So I would diagnose these cuts as having been caused by a human or animal, i.e. mechanical injury. They do look like something sharp like a knife or a sharp edged piece of equipment sliced into the plant's stem. Was the plant moved around recently or could an animal have gotten hold of it?

Harald

[MikeInOz]

People seem to be quite scared of cutting cacti. I don't know why because it almost never fails. Cut to clean tissue and re root it. Meanwhile cut the old stem down to the base (it will should re-shoot - or cut it out completely) and repot the whole clump into fresh mix. You can use the same pot, just change the mix. This plant has been starved for quite some time. The trick with these South American plants (Notocacti) is a very open slightly acidic mix so you can water and feed heavily. You don't need much more than fine orchid bark and sand.

[rlwremo]

Thanks Harald.

I may upload a picture of the whole setup with the other cacti. The 2 with this issue are pretty protected as they are both in the back row. Last time they were moved was back in Janauary briefly. We live in north central florida and as the joke goes we have 2 seasons here, January and the rest of th year. So in January, there were a couple of times where we had to bring them indoors for a couple of nights. But these cracks are very recent.

Maybe a critter could have been involved, but we don't have that many squirrels around. There is the occaisional armadillo in the neighborhood.

Thanks for the input.

[rlwremo]

Thanks MikeinOz. will definately look into that. As I mentioned to Harald, in a little bit I will upload a shot of the entire bench. Appreciate the input!

though I don't think this is a Notocacti (in the parodia genus). We think it's in the Cleistocactus genus.

But giving it some extra food certainly couldn't hurt. Thanks!

[7george]

Usually over-watering causes splitting of the stem like this. Not sure but green algae on the surface of the soil means these are kept quite wet. So if no significant rot will be found around that split the excess water would be the problem.

Also I'm pretty sure cacti seen above are Echinocactus (Parodia) leninghausii.