When I watched this morning I thought of writing that I bought an Astrophytum asterias last month. Then later today at Home Depot I bought a nice A. myriostigma. So my wish list for that genus is complete. 🙂
If someone is in the habit of overwatering and gets stem rot, it's likely they'll overwater again so perhaps it's not worth the trouble, but... If caught early so that only a small part has rotted, you can unpot the plant, remove the soil, trim out the rotting part, and let it callus over for a few weeks before repotting. Success will depend a lot on how far the rot has progressed. Seems like harsh treatment, but most cacti will survive bare root for quite a while. Yes, the plant will be marred, but if it's precious to you then marred might be better than dead. A lot of cacti need that cool rest in the winter to flower and I have trouble with them, but A. myriostigma flowers pretty easily during the summer months. You do need two if you want to produce fruit and seeds. Typically the flowers have a nice scent. Astrophytum is a genus that has had a lot of hybridization and horticultural work done on it to produce interesting plants for the trade.
Salvaging cacti can be tricky business, but as you said, if its worth it for sentimental reasons, then you should try. I've talked a bit about getting cacti to flower, but I need to go into more detail in a specific video. I didn't realize they had done hybridization on Astrophytum. It's not a genus I see a lot, but it's also not rare either. Cacti have done a great job of hybridizing themselves over time, lol.
i kinda feel like this would be a good cactus for someone who otherwise doesn't like cacti, mostly on account of being less stabby so, is astrophytum actually less tolerant of being wet than other cacti or do you just mean they're harder to save if things go badly? the echinocactus i have are honestly pretty okay with getting watered regularly as long as they have a lot of light and they can drain out completely first
I was more referring to the general barrel-shaped cacti, which, once they have stem rot, are a little tricky to salvage. So that applies to a large number of cacti, including Astrophytum. I also water mine regularly and never have any problems.
@@banesbotanicals1287 A fun story from last summer: I had some of my cactus outside because, and between a combination of 6+ weeks with no rain and temperatures in the upper 90s, and the fact that the siding of the house is white and reflected a bunch of extra insolation back onto them on top of what they were already getting, by the end of august I was having to water them multiple times a week because of how quickly they were drying out. (Dragonfruit being from the tropics probably didn't help.)
When I watched this morning I thought of writing that I bought an Astrophytum asterias last month. Then later today at Home Depot I bought a nice A. myriostigma. So my wish list for that genus is complete. 🙂
Good timing! After some consideration I've decided just to stick with the one I have.
If someone is in the habit of overwatering and gets stem rot, it's likely they'll overwater again so perhaps it's not worth the trouble, but... If caught early so that only a small part has rotted, you can unpot the plant, remove the soil, trim out the rotting part, and let it callus over for a few weeks before repotting. Success will depend a lot on how far the rot has progressed. Seems like harsh treatment, but most cacti will survive bare root for quite a while. Yes, the plant will be marred, but if it's precious to you then marred might be better than dead.
A lot of cacti need that cool rest in the winter to flower and I have trouble with them, but A. myriostigma flowers pretty easily during the summer months. You do need two if you want to produce fruit and seeds. Typically the flowers have a nice scent. Astrophytum is a genus that has had a lot of hybridization and horticultural work done on it to produce interesting plants for the trade.
Salvaging cacti can be tricky business, but as you said, if its worth it for sentimental reasons, then you should try.
I've talked a bit about getting cacti to flower, but I need to go into more detail in a specific video. I didn't realize they had done hybridization on Astrophytum. It's not a genus I see a lot, but it's also not rare either. Cacti have done a great job of hybridizing themselves over time, lol.
Very nice plant! I killed my fav of euphorbia lately and it shows that this one is really hard to get cuttings to get roots 😌 I'm hopless!
No one is hopeless! You got this!
i kinda feel like this would be a good cactus for someone who otherwise doesn't like cacti, mostly on account of being less stabby
so, is astrophytum actually less tolerant of being wet than other cacti or do you just mean they're harder to save if things go badly? the echinocactus i have are honestly pretty okay with getting watered regularly as long as they have a lot of light and they can drain out completely first
I was more referring to the general barrel-shaped cacti, which, once they have stem rot, are a little tricky to salvage. So that applies to a large number of cacti, including Astrophytum. I also water mine regularly and never have any problems.
@@banesbotanicals1287 A fun story from last summer: I had some of my cactus outside because, and between a combination of 6+ weeks with no rain and temperatures in the upper 90s, and the fact that the siding of the house is white and reflected a bunch of extra insolation back onto them on top of what they were already getting, by the end of august I was having to water them multiple times a week because of how quickly they were drying out.
(Dragonfruit being from the tropics probably didn't help.)