Cactus farm investment TEK 900 seeds to sow

[mint]

I am planning on growing as many cacti i can fit in 4m x 1m x 1m area with a second level 70 cm above ground and 4m x 30cm

calculating the area between seeds and the aread i have i can fit 890 seeds

atm im going to be using the takeaway tek with personal adjustments, its going to go a little like this,

rinse growing medium in fine sifter (so you dont loose mix down the drain) thoroughly until water coming out is not cloudy

lightly soak medium with Canna VEGA and Canna Rhizotonic 1/4 to 1/2 or even 1/8 strength unsure of a good strengh and unsure if the nutrients will survive the sterilaztion process

drain soil until moist

sterilise soil in oven

OR

steam sterilize ( if canna vega fert does vaporise away and recondense this method could be benefecial by adding fert to the boiling mixture and let the nutrient rich steam provide nutrients to the soil just a theory advice wanted)

OR

sterilize in a pressure cooker not sure which method is best advice is welcome

place growing medium into airtight white plastic containers 45cm wide 50cm long 20 - 25cm high that let in shadded indirect light

spray the top layer of soil in the container with a mix of nobles pureau water (hopefully keeping the container sterile) and Canna Vega & Canna Rhizotonic again 1/8 strength as said in takeaway tek.

the theory is having plent of nutrients for the little roots to eat and grow up to be big thick luscious roots ;)

sowing pachanoi seeds roughly 7cm apart giving me 500 seeds in 3.47 meteres

sowing williamsii seeds roughly 3.5-4cm apart in a shallower air tight container maybe 15 - 20cm deep giving me 240 seeds in the left over .5m area and on the second level of my hot house which is 70cm above the ground and 30 cm wide 4m long i can fit another 152 seeds having 390 loph seeds sowed.

duct taping all containers around lid to ensure no airflow for contamination and natural terrarium effect.

place air tight containers in a hot house

build 8 1m x 1m frames for 70%shade cloth which can be mobile will remain on for first month to 2 months then taken off. to let in stronger light.

THE HEAT FACTOR:

heat is always a bitch if you ask me, i just hope it doesnt get too hot in the containers and in winter i will place polystyrene under all the containers to insulate the cold from the concrete, then snug containers with hay to insulate the winter cold.

The hot house will have fair sized gaps for airflow and 70% shade cloth until most of the summer heat is over hopefully the reduced light threw the containers palstic block out some of the heart

unsure of a perfect soil mix at this moment advice also wanted on medium parts.

do trich species like deep or wide pots?

how deep do you think the soil in the container should be 7cm - 10cm? will this support 6 months growth,

Edited December 14, 2010 by mint

[tripsis]

You can do it more simply than you are planning and more efficiently too. You can also use half-strength fertiliser with no problems.

Rather than spacing your seedson the assumption that every one will germinate, which they almost certainly will not, sow them at a rate of around 1 per square centimetre. When they begin overcrowding, transplant as you see fit.

My preference is to sterilise in a pressure cooker, but it proabably matters little. Once sterilised, you don't need to (and can't) keep the interior sterile, so don't worry about it. Tap water is fine. The seeds are not sterile, so as soon as they are sown, the environment inside the containers is no longer sterile.

[bℓσωηG]

how deep do you think the soil in the container should be 7cm - 10cm? will this support 6 months growth

4cm deep is alot, i use straight coarse sand now and have few contam issues. i wouldnt worry about fertilizer just yet.

[mint]

Tripsis.

thanks for the fertilizer advice, im going to leave the cactus spread out as they are which will allow me to leave them from 6 months - 1 year without haveing to stress the by moving them i read somewhere cactus like lateral root space and they can be stressed to close together, my goal is to grow them all as fast as possible and thats by not disturbing the baby roots

Blowng.

i will do 7cm just to give them extra room incase they need it and after using canna fertilizer it crosses my mind if it could be good in your morning cereal

really good fertilizer ;) and providing all the nutrients a plant could want to grow if you had the option to add it asif you wouldnt.

[mutant]

1 seed per square centimetre ?

I am trying again the 'crowded' concept, closed box tek takeaway tek you call it?

I sowed some 1500-2000 seeds in two containers 20-x10cm

and some 1/4 of the total sowing surface were astrophytum seeds which are pretty big. notocacti, stenocacti, some lopho and tricho, mammilaria, epithelanthea a.o.

it can be done, and the fuckers seems to like it. I repeated because the first one seems to go well sofar

future will tell!!! I know I might loose some more seedlings and maybe some more in the transplant and maybe a bit in base shape. But I think it's cool. I saw some awesome pics from an italian guy some time ago. he had a meterXmeter shallow container with tons of astro seedlings. The fuckers loved it. If the plans love it, it can't be that bad.

Note that it might work better with astro cause they're spineless, well half of the species. When seedlings of spiny species begin to bare more 'serious' spines, making damage too, it might be better to start tranplanting.

Like I said future will tell

Edited December 14, 2010 by mutant

[tripsis]

Mutant, I've sowed seeds in a very crowded fashion like you did around 8 months ago. They are so ridiculously crowded and stunted as a result of it. Looking at them from above, it is a solid mass of tiny, spiny cacti with no room to grow. While others sown at the same time, but with space, are now over an inch, these ones are still maybe 0.5cm. Notlooking forward to having to repot them when the time comes...

As far as I can tell, cacti when they have limited root room will stall. They can sit there for a long time without doing anything, because they can't grow. So sowing seeds thickly will ended up in stunted seedlings until they are planted out with more root room.

Edited December 15, 2010 by tripsis

[mutant]

Hmmm is it Trichoecerei you're talking about? Cause I have noticed trichos got a different behaviour from seed compared to real cacti, which is pretty normal. Even if they're tricho, trichos stall anyways in my experience. Trichos also don't love the closed tek too much for too long but they will stall hardgrown too.

IME, Melocacti, astrophtums and more, LOVE being crowded. Not once did they stall. I cannot really compare and be sure, as I have not a lot of sowings under my belt

and my growings were all with no special lights and so..

other than that have yoy seen cacti seedlings roots? I am sure you have. It makes no sense they won't grow just because they're crowded. they really don't need much space. Space is available. Cheetahs love to grow along with their brothers/sisters and they manage better when doing so . Why not cacti

Last but not least, being impatient with cacti equals grafting. If you found faster rates with other teks, be my guest, for me , for now, the crowded tek is both beautiful to look at, practical [little space for the containers] and pretty effective, especially for astros.

[tripsis]

Yes, all Trichocereus species.

Cause I have noticed trichos got a different behaviour from seed compared to real cacti

Must have missed the news bulletin that Trichocereus aren't in the Cactaceae family anymore.

You're cheetah argument is flawless. ;)

Yes, I've seen their roots.Not large, but definitely well in contact with the other. Have you seen the roots on a cactus which has stalled in its pot? It doesn't have to be rootbound to stall (but at least being on its way to be rootbound).

The only adjustment I've tried for getting faster rates is to space the seed more appropriately from the beginning. Seedling that are not initially overcrowded tend to grow faster and bigger than those that are.

[mutant]

Well tripsis

I didn't mean to sound like a smartass , I am just assuming stuff from my experience and sharing to see other opinions.

Everyone is talking about 'cacti from seed' in this thread but it seems they're talking Tricho from seed .

So, IME, Trichocereus failed where other cacti seedlings survive, that is the closed tek. It might be because trichocerei babies cannot take the intense humidity in the box or that they have lower humidity tolerance when babies. I have seen not too crowded tricho seedlings all die in a closed boxed where other genera grew actively very crowded. [look pics below]

Maybe someting I am doing in the closed tek works with other genera but not trichos. [too much fungicide or too much water?]

But one of the main points was that perhaps tricho seedlings has not the same behviour as other slower growing cacti seedlings.

A 2,5 year old bridge , 50 cm in heigh , hard grown from seed next to a spherical cacti of the same age already show trichoecerei are pretty different to 'real' cacti. Yeah they all belong to Cactacea , and so does Pereskiopsis or Aztekium.

Yes, I've seen their roots.Not large, but definitely well in contact with the other. Have you seen the roots on a cactus which has stalled in its pot? It doesn't have to be rootbound to stall (but at least being on its way to be rootbound).

maybe, [just maybe] the stalling is due to another factor and not contact to each others roots, or this might be partially true for Trichos but not all cacti.

So yeah, not having experience with crowded tricho seedlings they might not like crowding. Makes some sense, but I think it's a matter of sheer space and not interaction. I tend to believe that sparce planting of lots of year old [1+ y.o. ] tricho seedlings in a biggish container might be better than individual pots, let alone the space you gain in the growing room.

Another fact of trichos that makes the crowding rather a no-no are the spines [injurying each other] and due to them, the trouble in replanting and seperating as they grow.

last but not least, I think Tricho seedlings and all seedling for that matter, sometimes stall anyway. Temps or other enviromental factors might have more into it than crowding.

It also doesn't make much sense evolutionary or something. Stunt growth is guaranteed if you leave them crowded, but I have a feeling it might help, at least some species, for a while. Older cacti seem to love to be in the same pot with other cacti too, properly spaced apart, but this is certainly not true for trichocerei, and for sure not when they're mature.

But lots of people have noticed that cuts various genera strangely seem to root faster when crowded together. I wouldn't think of why this wouldnt be true for trichocerei...

PS: It also has to do a lot with the gardening style, hastiness, whether you want some plants selected from the lot or keeping all. keeping many of them in a single pot has cerain adtantages, but it's not really applicable to trichos which grow large pretty soon.

Some 1,5 y.o. seedlings, they were started for 6 months in closed box, then stayed there for another 6 but I opened from time to time then in a bigger container. I can only imagin how the roots in htere are like, but the plants seem pretty happy for 1,5 y.o. I think... Maybe it is of some importance that astros have tap roots. I have shown these in the past

Epithelanthea micromeris

astro asterias

astro myriostigma

Stenocacti

3x Tricho terscheckii

in regard with that last

I noticed terschecki, which btw has a more 'real' cactus behaviour overall managed the closed tek, whereas the faster growing bridgesii and wendermanianus died. Same take away box the rest genera thrived.

You can check out my cacti seedling porn thread, where some part of my experience is logged

Anyways, peace

Edited December 18, 2010 by mutant

[tripsis]

Mutant, I hope you didn't take my joking to heart...

I too am only speaking from what I've experienced and seen and seeing as the only cacti I've grown from seed are Trichocereus and Lophophora I can only comment on them.

Using the takeaway tek, I've had good results with the both of the above genera, especially if spaced well in the first place. I don't use fungicide unless there's an outbreak of mould, which has only happened with old seed. I'll take some pics of the stunted and overcrowded seedlings I'm talking about at some point, but they're at a friend's place, so you'll have to wait until I'm there with a camera.

I'm not arguing against trichos having different behaviour to slower growing cacti, as my Lophs were fine with the crowding (but they've since been repotted and spaced).

The suggestion that maybe Trichos stall due to contact with one another's roots is just that, a suggestion. The reason could be anything really. That said, those that stall or slow, do have lot of root space (but down, not laterally), so they may have space to grow, but don't anyway. Thus it seems like it may be due to interaction. In the case of the most crowded ones I have, they actually have no space at all though.

Anyway, while the stalling/stunted growth might be attributed to several factors, for me it seems that it is mainly due to how well spaced the seedslings are.

By the way, nice pics. They look like happy seedlings.

[mutant]

no problem mate

[kadakuda]

you know that saying that goes something like "the biggest cause of cactus death is too much care"...there is merit to that. just saying that some things like shallow trays, over crowding etc can eactually be good.

overcrowding seedlings grow far fast...dont ask me why, but no one i know has ever denied this. i persoanlly just sow and transplant when they grow into each other. to each their own. plant them and work out your favourite method, but by far sowing seeds carefully is far more time consuming and the result is probably not much better, if at all.

[Gunter]

sounds good excepting for the part about being sterile or axenic... that is not needed and can even work against you, soil microbes tend to make friends with the cacti,

[mutant]

I use fungicide but don't terilise . Maybe I am lazy, now that I got a microwave I might start doing it more often

I really can't imagine the closed tek work without sterilisation and/or fungicide.

[Gunter]

I've raised over a thousand cactus plants from seed, using a closed container method, without any sterilization or fungicide.

[mutant]

totally close? for how long did they stay in? what it's volume of container? what genuses?

and most importantly , you never have a portion die of rot??

[Gunter]

totally close?

closed and close, as in crowded to the point that they were clearly sown too thick

for how long did they stay in?

up to about half a year, depending on various factors like lighting and growth rate and how thick they are sown

what it's volume of container?

typically about a liter, but i have used ziploc plastic bags as well as square plastic containers, both with and without containers to hold soil mix.

I have even sown in containers by putting media in and planting seed and adding some water, without any drainage holes, and just put the lid on and put the whole thing under a nice light source.

what genuses?

mostly trichocereus, i've been growing them from seed for many years including various species, collections and hybrids, but also i've used the method with gymnocalycium, turbinicarpus and various delosperma a non-cactus

and most importantly , you never have a portion die of rot??

no, but i make sure that the moisture content is not excessive despite being enough for germination and growth

whenever i have had a plant rot, it was during the dormant period where nothing gets watered, in large batches of plants that are starting to get decent size, it is not uncommon to have a minority of specimens die, however i have yet to see any microbial pathogens attack cactus seed

[PD.]

IME tricho seedlings dont really have a problem with overcrowding but they hate having dry conditions of any sort, even for short periods of time. Take-away containers are too shallow for raising tricho seedlings for any extended period of time i have found, they need more rootspace/depth to get going past the early stage of growth. An enlarged version of the take-away method works well but for smaller amounts the baggie method with 63mm squat pots beats it hands down.

[tripsis]

They do look pretty happy PD. How old would they be? Also, is that clear plastic in the background a lid for those containers? Would love to see your setup one day.

[mutant]

to the extreme!!!

Archeaa i'm talking 100% sealed, mush smaller containers, no drainage holes of course. They can stay in up to 18 months reportedly.

Edited December 25, 2010 by mutant