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Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Tue Sep 07, 2021 6:26 pm
by ohugal
One of my favorite cacti: Pterocactus hickenii
Photograph by: Oscar Hugal
Picture taken at: Oscar Hugal's private collection

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sat Mar 05, 2022 7:08 pm
by mmcavall
Isn't it painfully slow?

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sat Mar 05, 2022 9:29 pm
by ohugal
It is. It's very hard to tell whether 'I'm doing it right'. New growth is often slightly reddish. I have it about 2 years. In a year or so I can start giving it a proper rest period, which is not the case right now. The goal is to have it flower and put some colour on that 'grotesque' body. I also have two P. tuberosus (unflattering picture attached).
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Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sun Mar 06, 2022 12:59 am
by mikethecactusguy
It appears to be light starved. New growth is very leggy compared to the older area's.
Mike M

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sun Mar 06, 2022 7:45 am
by ohugal
The one on the left is a Maihueniopsis clavarioides. I thought it was a Pterocactus when I bought it. It is indeed etiolated, as is the P. tuberosus on the right. In the future I hope to provide better growing conditions (more direct sunlight, colder rest, etc...) and in a year or so place them outside. I live in a small appartment, but am renovating a house with a garden where we move to in June.

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2022 5:43 pm
by mikethecactusguy
You should buy some grow lights to augment the lighting. Leggy growth never fills in. They will always look that way. Just a suggestion
Mike M

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2022 7:54 pm
by ohugal
Ok. Thanks. I grow them in my bedroom, so that's not really an option. Anyway, I a few months they'll be in front of a large window receiving lots of direct sunlight. I'll also be able to install extra lighting if necessary. Unfortunately the appartment came first, then the succulents...

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sat Mar 12, 2022 12:33 pm
by DaveW
The stiff spined form like yours used to be known as P. skottsbergii, but is often lumped under P. hickenii.

Norbert and Elizabeth Sarnes have done a lot of work on Pterocactus and Austrocactus and their Pterocactus book can be read here.

http://cactus-de-patagonia.de/wp-conten ... _SAR_E.pdf

Pterocactus do not like high temperatures and like good ventilation since it is windy in many places they come from so do not overheat in the sun. They do well in my cold greenhouse down to freezing over winter or outside in summer and flower well. They tend to be rambling plants and most are not really for the show bench.

Unlike most cacti the flowers are terminal on the stems so once that stem has flowered it is "blind" and cannot grow any longer so has to branch out at the side or produce another flower from the side. You can see the cavity from the previous years flower in the end of the stem below and the new flower from the side which when it dies will leave a similar cavity.

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As you can see below they are interesting rather than attractive out of flower and being tuberous rooted in addition to leaving craters in the end of the stems when they flower the tips of stems (maybe aborted flowers?) or the branch itself can often die off. In habitat the branches are often lost in the dry season and regenerate from the tuber the next year and flower.

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Pterocactus tuberosus is usually the easiest to obtain since it falls apart more than the others in winter, often shedding a lot of the top branches, something that is normal in habitat. One way of often getting it to flower is to remove many of the top branches and it will regenerate some new ones and immediately flower, the plant below has a tuber as large as a golf ball.

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Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2022 6:34 am
by MrXeric
That's a great book, thanks for sharing Dave.

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2022 10:25 am
by DaveW
The Sarnes have also done a book on Austrocactus from the same regions, but I don't think it is online. I think Daiv stocked it in US and so did Keith's Cactus Books in UK but whether they still have it I do not know?

https://exoticplantbooks.com/detail/?product_id=1110

Norbert and Elizabeth are probably the leading authorities on Patagonian cacti and have their own website that can usually be translated using Googles auto translator or similar.

http://cactus-de-patagonia.de/

If you click on the links in the following it will take you to pictures.

http://cactus-de-patagonia.de/kakteen

I was lucky and managed to get quite a few different species of Austrocactus from Norbert before the UK came out of the EU and made importing difficult.

Re: Pterocactus hickenii

Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2022 10:42 am
by ohugal
Indeed! I read it with pleasure. As soon as I have space to sow these, I will.