Every year I feature cactus costumes in October on the blog. This year I’ve decided to do something different. This year I am going to pass judgement on these things.
For you, I offer the best and worst of the year in cactus costumes.
1. The Best for 2010
This one is handmade by Cyndi in Meridian, ID. She says, “The homemade cactus costume was a complete original design and was sewn from fleece, twine, fake flowers, and pot from the dollar store.”
Excellent!
2. The Worst for this year, and maybe some other years too.
This one comes from City Fancy Dress in Brisbane (presumably in Australia) under their category, “Something Different.” Indeed. Different does not mean better, clearly.
Interesting look at the Pitaya market and new varieties being developed to be tastier and use even less water. These are from the night-blooming Hylocereus from Central America, although the Pitaya name can also be applied to many different cactus fruit. The more common name around here is Dragon Fruit.
The most interesting part is the difficulties with pollinating a night-blooming plant when it’s been taken out of it’s native habitat, away from it’s night-pollinator.
Maybe I should add a margarita recipe to this post. What do you think?
Well, this is what I found:
Red Dragon Cocktail
*Vanilla Vodka
*Stawberry Liqueur
*Dragon fruit
*strawberry
*Vanilla syrup
You should click through for the instructions, but the instructions are really just to pour it all together and stir. Easy enough.
The Lophophora williamsii cactus, pictured, is not on Hong Kong’s dangerous drugs list but has for centuries been linked with transcendence practices and psychedelic psychotherapy. It is commonly known as peyote.
Narcotics Bureau officers raided Exland Nursery on Flower Market Road on Sunday afternoon and seized 34 pots of the plant for testing. A label saying “Lophophora Williamsii = Ketamine” was attached to the plants at the nursery.
The lesson is clear – don’t sell peyote in Hong Kong as a substitute for an illegal drug. I would add that this is a good policy in the US too, where peyote is specifically illegal.
The website doesn’t have a picture of the florist or the peyote but for some reason there is this image on the page.
So todays contest is simple. Identify the plant in the first picture and win the plant in the second picture. But here’s the little wrinkle. You must come to the store today with the answer! Sorry for all you people who don’t live in the Bay Area (Go Giants).
So please, don’t answer the question in the comments. Come in to the store for the free plant instead!
This is the plant you want to ID in person only at the store to win a free plant.
Nemesia fruticans is the free plant you get. We have 5 left of these reliable drought-tolerant perennials that will bloom for most of the year. Yay!
Danger Garden has spotted a carwash with some tortured shrubbery in the shape of Saguaros, also known as “Arborvitae Saguaro” – quite the fancy name for such as that. Impressive!
First we mummify the plant and then we deliver it to you on a stretcher and we lay it out on the ground nice and gentle while wearing nitrile gloves
Then we plant it and remove all the wrappings and walk away from a job well done!
Now, don’t go getting all pedantic on me, you know I know that’s not a cactus – it’s a Euphorbia. I didn’t say these were photos of us installing a cactus, I said this post was about how to install a cactus. We just chose a Euphorbia for this particular demonstration, but the information is the same.
Glottiphyllum longum is one of the least popular of the plants we carry. Practically nobody likes it. Every month I bring out new mesembs and they sell well, unusual things as they are, but not this one. Our current crop is big and fat and still nobody cares. We’ve had them for over 2 years now, so you would think if someone liked it we’d know by now. So please, I beg you, buy one from me, just to humor me.
Oh, and while it’s true that I live near Oakland and go to A’s games occasionally, Go Giants.
From a newspaper called the Gaston Gazette comes this local story of a local woman who made it into her local newspaper for getting a cactus to bloom!
Hilda Olive with a blooming ‘Epiphyllum oxypetalum,’ commonly known as an orchid cactus, that she has been plant-sitting for her niece at her Gastonia home on Saturday October 16, 2010. The plant rarely blooms, and only at night, with flowers wilting before dawn.
Photo: Ben Goff / The Gazette
I wonder where this Gaston place is? I don’t know, but searching around their website, I found this reference to a local Scottish Heritage Day, with video of bagpipers at work (NSFW if your place of business doesn’t allow bagpipers).
Make sure you click the photo for the full size version. It gets a lot bigger…
Here’s an interesting story of cactus being used as part of the admissions process to Oxford. I assume its a good subject because the information is readily deducible and yet most applicants don’t already have a prior knowledge of the inner workings of the cactus.
Teenagers being interviewed for a place at Oxford might be handed a cactus and asked to describe it… according to sample questions released by the university today in an attempt to demystify its admissions procedure….
The interviewer who set the cactus question, Martin Speight, of St Anne’s College, said: “We give the student a cactus in a pot and a close-up photo of the cactus’s surface structure and ask them to describe the object in as much detail as possible using the plant and the photo. We are looking for observation, attention to detail, both at the large and micro scale.”
Candidates seeking a place on an undergraduate degree in biological sciences are expected to deduce why the cactus is bulbous, or why it has a particular array of spines.
“There will frequently be more than one logical answer to these questions, and we are likely to follow one answer with another question – for example: ‘The big spines are to stop the cactus being eaten, yes, but by what sort of animals?’,” Speight said.
“We would also bring in more general questions at the end of the cactus discussion such as what are the problems faced by plants and animals living in very dry habitats such as deserts.”
As a followup I would ask: if the challenges of the animals living in the desert include dealing with the spines on the cactus, and the challenges of the cactus include animals that want to get past the spines and eat it, how has this particular balance been maintained for so long?
However for today’s class we’re asking all of you loyal readers to describe everything you see in the above photo, using as many botanical terms as possible. Extra points for correct use of the word “Aureoles” and double scores for use of the phrase “Ripped apart by a javelina in heat”.
The Baltimore Sun apparently interviewed Debra Lee Baldwin about her book, Succulent Container Gardens. I say apparently, because there’s no interview posted. Who knows what’s going on in Baltimore.
But anyway, they recommend the book, so that’s enough!
Cactus, of course. It’s the Southern California way.
The Palomar Cactus & Succulent Society will hold a plant show and sale from 9 a.m to 5 p.m. Oct. 23 and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Oct. 24 at the San Diego Botanic Garden, 230 Quail Gardens Drive, Encinitas. The opening judging is from noon to 3 p.m. The public will be able to follow along as the judges comment on entries and make their selections in seven divisions of cacti and succulents for both novice and advanced participants. The judges also will announce the best cactus, best succulent and best in show winners. The plant vendors will have specimens for collectors as well as beginners.
At the nursery we’re focusing on some new houseplants for terrariums and wall panels and other indoor uses for the winter season that is upon us. See the list of plants we have and are growing and the rest we should have available any day now at the nursery.
See anything you like? Anything important that we’re missing, since the list is so small? Let Ian know!
I love small cactus. But I have a problem keeping them alive. I have tried keeping several cactus and they always end up the same – and in a fairly short time: they shrivel, looking loose and floppy around the top, and turn a sick yellow-green mushy color around the base (see attached photo).
Because they look shrivelled I assume that I am not watering enough, so I water a bit more – but to no avail. The attached photo is a cute little cactus in a 2″ pot I bought at the store about 2 months ago – and have been giving maybe a couple of tablespoons of water about every 2 weeks (it is on my desk at work, at it is farily dry here so it dries out very quickly). I feel terrible that such a cute little plant should look so unhealthy. My roommate in college had a fairly healthy cactus that he carefully gave 1 tablespoon of water every month – which didn’t seem like much to me, but his cactus was still alive after several years. Does that mean I am over watering mine? If so, why does it look like a deflated baloon? Does this species require more water than my ex-roommate’s cactus? Should I really soak it when I water it then wait for it to dry, or just slightly moisten it periodically per current practice? And what periodicity (obviously the current rate isn’t working!)?
Any advice would be appreciated.
David
David,
In general we recommend watering cactus every 3 weeks – drenching it and letting it drain away so that it never sits in water. Overall, watering every 2 weeks but a smaller amount is probably fine, so I would look elsewhere for the problem.
First off, where do you live? Your local humidity levels can impact a watering schedule. Next, how much sunlight is the plant getting? We recommend a minimum of 4 hours of direct afternoon sun through the spring and summer. And finally, the plant is in a tiny plastic pot with what looks like a houseplant soil mix, so in general we would repot into a 4″ terra cotta pot with a fast draining cactus soil.
These grassy members of the aloe family are usually orange-flowered, but this crop is yellow. Just so you know. It’s rhizomatous, but not invasive. Southern African of course. Widespread through some of the hilly desert regions.
It’s English common name is “Stalked Bulbine” so you can see why I like the South African name better, in the title, not that I can pronounce it. Let’s try Rank-O-Pee-Ay-Va.
In case anyone was wondering, my brother in law who lives in Austin was attacked by a serial killer 30 years ago and lived to tell about it, right here on the radio from earlier today.
Pam’s Digging has discovered a fantastic truck/cactus combo in Austin. You have to click through. I’ll be on the lookout now for my own truck to plant up.
New Jersey resident writes in to her local newspaper, and they print her story and a photo too.
I do not know the technical name for this cactus plant, but my dad called it a prickly pear cactus. He owned a home in Westwood. I transplanted a couple of cuttings and it has thrived — with bright yellow flowers — every year in front of my home for 20 years.
— Donna Keith, Park Ridge
Anyone want to help Donna out with a species name?
Somebody took a 360degree photo of a cactus garden in the Canary Islands, so that you could enjoy it.
The Jardin de Cactus was very busy when we were there (mid August) and we couldn’t summon the energy to queue with the coach loads of fellow tourists, for our “free” drink at the cafe. There was also a queue to reach the old windmill, which is still used to grind cornflour. The water garden at the centre was disappointingly green and smelly, but we did like the primitive, caveman-style drawings, telling you which loo was which.
You did enjoy it, didn’t you? What, you haven’t clicked through yet to see what I’m talking about? Fools!
