PositiveHAL

Report to follow, after several hours of 'surgery' the 12 y.o loph graft was dismantled piece by piece, each bit carefully considered for grafting, or re-rooting, or just plain rooted bits that were no good for propagating. Now its the wait and see game.

Hi all, im Negative Dave from Melbourne, a little about me, ive been growing cactus casually for over a decade, but just now im getting right into grafting after rescuing my 10 year old monster peyote graft that has been looked after by my relatives while ive been travelling. To my shock its gone rapidly down hill in the past year, its almost detached from the trich rootstock, has had significant rot and lost buttons, has an ant? colony living in its guts, and is generally unhappy, ive acquired some peres and trichs/myrtles etc, for some rescue grafting but out of the 1st round of trich/myrtle grafts am not having much luck might be lucky to have 1 take, im about to graft some of the smaller peyote offsets onto peres. Anyways i just secured and awesomely frickin' huge Trich. pervianus? (confirmed I.D appreciated) with a 5ft and 4ft thick columns, woo hoo!, in addition to a heap of soil grown short spined t.scops(confirmed I.D appreciated) and a slightly longer spined scop. Any way im keen to go along to the upcoming Melbourne gathering i saw on here recently and meet some local peoples, feel free to to message me if you're local and interested in meeting up for a graft fest or plant swap, etc. Cheers, Negative Dave EDITED BY MODERATOR: NO COMMENTS ABOUT INGESTION!

anyone know about this cactus: Azureocereus Hertlingianus could this cross with a trich to result in what ive got?? i havn't thought this through, just stumbled across it then, nice looking btw

awesome pics of the moth looks like a jet fighter!

theres always the dreaded black weed matting, horrible stuff but sometimes its necessary.... get the perforated kind too, not the solid plastic kind. works well when combined with a stone mulch on top.

also weeds can be really beneficial, they can be great indicators of soil condition, nutrition, ph, etc. but you dont want them to get to the point of out competing your cactus goodies, of course

hi, i'd put a thick (10-15cm) layer of large pebble or stone mulch around the entire area, and then manage any weed growth by hand, rock mulch helps by radiating heat to the roots and cactus especially in colder climes. personally i'd avoid any earthy wood chippy type mulches as you will probably retain too much moisture and run into all sorts of other problems, also weeds find it really difficult to grow in a large aggregate rock mulch.

Hi there, i could definately lighten your load, PM sent

Hey Niggles count me in!! im happy to help out however possible

Repeat ALL SOLD http://melbourne.gumtree.com.au/c-Stuff-for-Sale-other-stuff-for-sale-Cactus-Collection-W0QQAdIdZ350419784

i cant believe i missed it, i work in that suburb too, i coulda pounced on it :BANGHEAD2: i spy a peruvian and a pedro in there too i think

Aww, thanks niggles, and same to you, thanks for inviting me into your cactus paradise, your collection is most impressive and inspiring!! im still blown away by those huge lophs! head round mine for a bevvie on the balcony some time Cheers NegativeDave

'foot fungus' that reminds me of a greenskeeper i once knew, whenever he had a case of tinea (in the 80's) he used to just go barefoot on the golf greens when he was spraying fungicide. cleared it right up he'd reckon... this is the same guy that got banned from spraying ANY chemicals at our workplace after bloodtests revealed that he had unacceptable levels of pesticide in his system.... but anyways, generally all of the pesticides/fungicides on the market are suitable for food crops/veges,etc as the long as the 'withholding period' is adhered to. In other words we are eating all the time anyway. Im thinking of using a 'Lime Sulfur' spray/drench as im guessing its more pH balanced than a purely sulfur based spray/powder (possibly too acidic), or else a phosphonic acid drench which is quite a strong and may be a bit drastic?? any thoughts? experiences?

cheers bit, knuthianus? hey, just when i thought Trich ID couldnt get any more complicated!!!, some serious taxonomy work needs doing on these plants!!!, thanks for the advice regarding the Loph, what fungicide specifically would you use?

fuck me! i planned on coming along only to realize it was yesterday oh well ill be keen for the next one NegativeDave

and what should i do about it?, its on my scops too Cheers, Negative Dave

No ones commented on the peyote being potted in the 9litre green bucket!! complete with drainage holes randomly stabbed with a set of felcos... like i said earlier things are very desperate for my once glorious peyote. Help is needed

Sure Niggles send me a PM, would love to. I was into this long before dedicated forums and knowledge was easily available on the net, so im reallly liking this, i guess im a bit of a late comer. ill probably be annoying you all with multiple posts in the coming days, until i can get to the bottom of my ID/pest/disease problems. BTW what is the PC in PC pachnoi?

here is another pic of the peyote graft, its barely attached and wobbles like a loose tooth, really dont know what to do with it, its heart breaking, its been so glorious for years, it was probably twice the size a couple of years ago but rot had killed 1/2 of it. the above picks after i cleaned it all up and removed all the rotting buttons and decayed tissue, also here is a pick of some smaller pups that got severed in the clean up process. These will hopefully go on the peres, but each day ive gotta throw more out due to rot, some of them have tiny roots though. would a "lime sulfur" drench or a "anti rot" phosphonic acid drench help??????

yes, like hard old scabs. dont think its come from black rot, as my scops have never had black rot

"The lighter green one in front of the stack of scops looks like a pach to me" The huge scops ive had for over 10 years, grow like mother fuckers when planted in the garden, got them from a well known cactus nursery in the hills district of Sydney, thats what the old peyote is grafted to, that other one in the front of the photo (below) is one i got from an old lady the other day, it seems identical to my almost spineless scops, dont know about it being a pachnoi? what do you guys reckon

sure was! very local to me

lots more pics if anyones interested. plus im in need of a fair bit of advice/ questions answered. Cheers, Negative Dave