I have two cactus'. I've had the smaller one for 4 years and the bigger one for two years. I found the below picture off of the internet, it looks just like them. But, the tops of them (the red part) has shrivled up and died on both plants. Should I trim it off? They've both grown "limbs" out, and they each have one main limb growing from the base of the plant. The smaller one has 6 smaller limbs that have grown out from the main limb, making a grand total of 7 limbs on the small one. The bigger one has only 1 limb growing from the main limb, making 2 limbs. (my math brain, hehe :-P) I love the little plants and want to give them the best care that I can. I have them in a plastic self-watering pot. It's about 4 1/2 inches across both ways, is this big enough for the both of them? It's about 3 1/2 inches deep. I've kept them in particial lighting by a window. There's little white things in the soil that grew, is this normal? I apologize for all of my questions, I just want to have my cacti live! :-P Thanks so much everyone! Lakota
(off-topic, but... osippi, please confirm you have permission to use that image or that it is copyright-free. If you can't confirm that, please remove it and perhaps link to a page that contains the picture or link to a page with a different photo. Thanks, I appreciate it!)
I just got rid of the picture. I finally got some batteries for my camera, so here's some photos of them:
Well, I’m no expert but I can take a stab at it if no one else wants to. First, I have no idea of the variety of cactus that is. But here are some general guidelines I know. There is no such thing as too much sun to cacti like that. If you have a sunnier spot that couldn’t hurt. Also, I don’t think that the “self watering pot is the best idea. Cacti, well succulents in general, like to dry quite a bit between waterings. The worst thing is too much water, and they really should be watered much at all in the winter. I wouldn’t cut the tops off. If they are dead then I would expect them to shrivel to the point where any thing that is supposed to come off will come off almost by itself. Here is a site with some good info: http://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheets/HGIC1502.htm Well... that’s the best I can do. Michael
What you originally had was a grafted cactus. The red top is a Gymnocalycium, the botton green portion is probably a Hylocereus. The red portion does not have enough chlorophyll to survive on its own roots so is grafted onto another plant. Looks to me like the Gymnocalycium portion has died but the Hylocereus can continue to grow as a vigorous houseplant. Its a tropical plant so should be kept above 50F. Otherwise, follow the advise Michael gave. Tracy
Alright, thanks everyone for the very helpful advice. They're still in the "self-watering" pot but I'm not putting water in the self watering part. So they are only being water when needing to be watered. I'm so glad I went with my intuition on this one, because I was literally just about to get up and trim the dead fruit off of the cactus after I checked this post. So is it an actual fruit or is it just some wierd plant part? So when it's ready to flower again it will drop the dead fruit? That's very interesting, it looks like it's shrivling up more as time goes on so I suppose that should make sense. :-P Thanks so much! Lakota
osippi: it is not a fruit, it is another plant artificially attached (grafted) to the plant with the roots. It is most likely dead and can be cut off. The lower part will not flower until it grows much bigger.
