Recently, on the social channels connected to the site, I published a short video in which I repot an Astrophytum asterias in a substrate composed solely of Seramis. Following that video, many asked me for information on this particular material with its characteristic orange colour, in fact little used in the cultivation of succulents and not easily available in small nurseries. I have had the opportunity to use Seramis in the past in the cultivation of some cactaceae and my experience has been decidedly positive (although, as a porous inert material, in my opinion pumice remains the best material ever) and it is also for this reason that I recently employed it for the Astrophytum subject of the video (video that you can also find at the end of this article).

Answering many questions received in recent weeks, let’s see in the following article what exactly Seramis is, what are the strengths and weaknesses of this material and what can be its use with succulents and, in particular, with cacti. (…)

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L'articolo Seramis, an alternative material for growing cacti and succulent plants: pros and cons proviene da Il fiore tra le spine.

Reproducing cacti starting from seeds is one of the best ways to get to know these plants in depth. Through sowing we can in fact observe the entire life cycle of the plant, from birth to the production of the first flower, to aging and death. Without forgetting the great satisfaction that the birth of seedlings is able to offer to those who practice sowing for the first time as well as those who have practiced it every year for decades. Not to mention the first flower: getting to see that the plant that we have given birth from a small seed, after two years or after twenty years depending on the species, finally opens its flower… it is priceless, there’s little to do. But before getting to all this – with regard to the sowing procedure, remember that on this site there is an entire section with at least fifteen articles dedicated to this topic at this link – you need to get the seeds. Banal, obvious. But without those you go nowhere. And there are two ways to get the seeds: buy them from specialized retailers (now almost exclusively online) or produce them with the manual pollination of your own plants. Or… simply collect the fruits that our plants have produced thanks to some pollinating insect, accepting the fact that two plants not of identical species may have been pollinated (and therefore we will be dealing with future hybrids), clean the fruits, store them and sow them in the spring.

In this article and in the related video we see how to clean and prepare the seeds for storage for future sowing. We sholud always remember that the seeds must be stored correctly, on pain of deterioration of the seeds and the consequent drastic drop in germinability. (…)

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L'articolo How to clean cactus fruits and how to store the seeds to reproduce our plants proviene da Il fiore tra le spine.

The real unknown factor is represented by the two Mammillaria in the unedited soil, very rich from an organic point of view. We will see over time how their growth will be affected by this substrate. With this consideration, exactly one year ago, I concluded my article on one of the experiments that I do from time to time on cacti and succulents. In the specific case it was a test with three different substrates, in fact three types of “soil”, in which I repotted six Mammillaria hahniana obtained from a single sowing.

After the first year of cultivation, here’s how the experiment is going and here are some initial considerations. (…)

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L'articolo After one year of cultivation, the first test results on six Mammillaria in three different potting soils proviene da Il fiore tra le spine.

Ok, between one drop and another of condensation inside the bag we can see some tiny green dots. The seeds gave birth to the first seedlings, in short, our baby cacti. And now? How do we proceed with the sowing of cacti and succulent plants after the first germinations? Should we open the bags right away? Should we keep the seedlings in full light or is it better to place them in a sheltered place? Should we water regularly the seedlings or it’s better to let the potting soil dry out? And, finally, can we fertilize?

In this article, let’s see what to do once the seeds of cacti and succulents have germinated, in other words how to move correctly to help the plants grow and avoid making the work done with sowing in vain. (…)

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L'articolo Sowing cacti and succulents: what to do when the first little plants are born proviene da Il fiore tra le spine.

The possibilities for making soil suitable for growing cacti and succulents are endless, as you can read in the articles in the appropriate section of this site. The materials with which we can make a substrate, on the other hand, are many: peat, pumice, lapillus, field earth, sand, gravel, etc. Likewise, it is important to remember that the various “ingredients” can be mixed together in many ways: for example, favoring the so-called “inert” rather than the organic component, or the coarser elements in the finer part, and so on.

If you want to learn more about the various materials that can be used to obtain substrates suitable for growing succulents, you can read this specific article.

The experiment

In this specific case, however, I have chosen, as an experiment, to repot some plants obtained from the same sowing (Echinocactus texensis) in three types of soil, so as to be able to evaluate how the various compositions of the substrates influence the growth of the plants. Naturally, it will take time to obtain the first results, even if the first differences in growth (mostly in the growth rate) can be appreciated already after the first year after repotting.

On repotting you can consult the articles contained in the section of the site which can be reached by clicking here. If, on the other hand, you want to know more about the texensis species of the Echinocactus genus, you can read this specific article.

Video

And here is the video of the experiment with the different types of substrate and the description of the materials used:

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Correlated articles

My experiments
How cultivation changes plants
A substrate test
The soil: the materials you can use
Wild cultivation

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L'articolo Repotting cacti: an experiment with different substrates to understand how potting soil affects growth proviene da Il fiore tra le spine.