nitrogen

Actually yes the growing conditions dramatically affect the phenotype - that's abundantly obvious to anyone who has grown these cacti for awhile in different environments.. Your "centipede" or whatever you're calling it on ebay these days would, for instance, not have such long spines if it were shade grown - at that point it might look a lot more like the Baker or KGC clone etc.. SpinyGator no offense, but I suspect people like MSSmith and many others on here have forgotten more about trichocereus cacti than you have yet learned.. If you're selling cuts of that thing on ebay and suggesting it's a Lumberjackus just because you think it sort of looks like one then you're doing the community a serious disservice..

Nice! Those spines have that Lumberjackus coloring to them..

To be clear, there is only one existing specimen of True Blue peruvianus - and Zelly tends to it with great care and devotion - in all the times I've been over to his cactus museum he's never let me even see it.. Nor anyone else..

Welcome BillyThKid! You will ingratiate yourself quite nicely indeed around here by posting cactus porn at regular intervals - that sort of behavior is very much encouraged.. This is definitely the spot for these sorts of cacti -"the nook" is great too but not as active, and the folks there aren't generally as fanatical as the people here.. Lots of experts here as well if you have any questions and great opportunities for trading and such.. I will disagree however about the 5-7 spines per areole being too many for a young pachanoi - IME most all young seedlings have more spines per areole as infants than they do as they bigger - not sure why this is, maybe to ensure their survival at that young age - but you'll see bridgesii which have piles of spines per areole as infants, and they progress to the usual 2-5 per areole or whatever thereafter..

I've hit trichos with full dose+ of 20-20-20 every 2 weeks during the growing season and they seem to love it.. I haven't pushed it beyond that, but the more the merrier is how mine respond..

That's exactly right - if you don't know, the fear could return.. Personally though, I'm seeing a little bit of existential anxiety in that stock there perhaps, but nothing I'd go so far as calling actual fright..

Hhhhmm.. So is it that Psycho0 x Paradeyes germinates well, but Paradeyes x Psycho0 not at all, or are both not germinating? I haven't sowed these yet myself.. Bean meaning too, along with some really nice crosses I got from Oz..

Per the clone naming thing, it used to be more that a clone got a name if it was special or noteworthy in some way, or had an interesting story behind it - now it does seem it's applied to pretty much every tricho in Oz, so just because a clone has a name doesn't mean there's anything special about it.. That said though, the bridgesii clones Lumberjackus, Psycho0, Eileen, N1, KGC, SS02, and Bruce anyway are all certainly worthy of being named.. There's lots of great clones out there though.. For breeding purposes though naming is very useful - we see this with ariocarpus and roses and so forth..

Yea those two were spectacular - they grew like beasts also, very rapid - though they eventually became rootbound, were put out in a very harsh all-sun landscaping environment, and stopped growing completely - they have almost fallen over, the roots are going into the ground which is all that keeps them up - that and the landscaping plants around it - they look all grey and dessicated etc - lol, but they flowered! I should prune them back and put the pot somewhere better for them.. Actually I think the N1 cross came the year before the psycho0 cross, but I can't recall.. Lol usually I keep better notes on these matters..

That's nice to see - beautiful seedlings - I am not surprised they are fast growing.. I don't have any of the Psycho0 x Cuzco cross - Zelly has a couple of mine in the ground at his place though - still small since they were never grafted, but I bet they'll be pretty awesome in a few years.. Btw the Cuzcoensis the Psycho0 was crossed with was seed grown - it isn't the common cuzcoensis clone we have here in the northern hemisphere.. I crossed one with Psycho0 and it's seed grown sibling with the N1 bridgesii the following year.. So the Psycho0xcuzcoensis and N1xcuzcoensis are different cuzcoensis - one has these huge reddish multicolor spines while the other has somewhat less huge and blondish spines.. I'm afraid I can't recall which was crossed with which though lol.. Here they are: [url=http://s199.photobucket.com/user/bringyourownbios/media/3Peru10May2007.jpg.html]

Yah and poking small holes in the incubator gradually over time is fine - I start this process well in advance of completely removing them from the thing. They just want to be fat and green looking when they're really young - too much sun or dry air and they'll sort of go into shock.. There's no real risk in keeping them too long in the high humidity - I suppose that eventually they might rot but I've never seen it..

I've found that letting them get to be a good size before hardening them off is better, if you want the quickest growth - I've kept mine in full humidity for like 3+ months - depends on your setup, I've never used fluoros, so mine grow slower than the fluoro setups.. Let them get at least 1/2-3/4" before starting to harden them off - if you do it to soon they can kinda get stunted - they'll turn into spiny tough little things but not grow fast for awhile..

It'll never work.. No I'm just kidding - in seriousness though I've always heard it a good idea to bake the soil in the oven for awhile to kill off any little molds etc that will want to grow once it's in the humid environ.. Also, the cactus and palm soil - some of those have peat moss or some damn thing that apparently trichos don't like much.. You can substitute that mix for some good worm castings and your cacti will love it..

Before anyone judges Zelly for this sort of neglect - you have to see it to believe it, the sort of things that are happening over at his place ;) The man has got his hands full, to say the least.. TPQC x TPM - I love that cross - for some reason its the one I have the fewest of, maybe 8-10 of them growing, I have several times that many TPM x (SS02 x pachanoi) going.. Lol, you would have thought I'd have seen to it that I wound up with quite a few of each hybrid for myself - and generally I did, but the TPQC x TPM is an exception.. And no more seed is left of any of these crosses, it's all in circulation or in the ground at this point.. They are all freaks though, the TPQC x TPM specimens - I selected only the mutants to graft and can't recall what happened to to the starter tray of them..

Hhhmmm, better try a larger sample size before jumping to conclusions ;) It could be that the layering wasn't at the base of the graft no? I mean, the scion may have just thought it was an obstruction, like another plant - in nature the plant would never have soil above the bottom of the plant but not at the bottom of the plant - so it may have evolved to not throw roots unless the very base of the plant is in soil..

Aw, a SS package! I remember those fondly..

Wow, amazing little specimens! I have had good success by simply planting mine while still grafted to the pereskiopsis - depending on how high up the pereskiopsis they are, either bury the whole thing until the base of the tricho is covered, or cut the pereskiopsis 2-4" down and bury that with the base of the tricho.. I suppose at some point the pereskiopsis might die and rot, and I'm not sure if this will transfer to the tricho, but so far mine are doing great that way, and I have heard that others have done it too with success..

I'll follow that theme - here's a grafted TPM x SS02 v. "Aldous".. That's a crested bridgesii below it, grafted to the same pachanoi

Here's a few of mine - lol, a lot of them are either sunburned or not getting enough light - these little babies have grown at like 2-3 different locations each.. TPM x N1 (SS02 x pachanoi) x TPM TPM x N1 - sunfried little freaks this batch are.. [/url] (SS02 x pachanoi) x TPC - this cross has produced some burly little seedlings, usually with longer spines TPC x Juules (or maybe the other two, but I think it's Juules based on seedling pheno and that Juules was the first pollen I hit the flower with). Look Nemisty, non-grafted! (SS02 x Pachanoi) x TPM TPM x N1 TPQC x TPM - the little one in the corner was grafted, but got knocked off, so is now growing happily on it's own roots TPM x (SS02 x pachanoi) TPC x Juules etc PsychoNaught x N1 - lots of blondes in this cross

Hostilis - those TPQC x TPM are really interesting - the batch I've got growing are def showing a certain sort of look that is different from the other TPM crosses.. EthnoGuy85 - that's a good question - in mine I wanna say it's like 30% or so, versus the 60% or so from the freak-as-mother crosses.. Nemisty, have no fear, I've got a some little trays of seedlings on their own roots - will post some pics in a bit if I can get around to it.. Grafting is so fun though - instant gratification rocks!

An epic saga - nice write-up Zelly! Lol yah I wasn't sure we could get that thing out of my apartment, but you had the gear and the know-how, and we got 'er done I told Zelly he needs to turn his home into an entheogenic cactus museum and charge admission - some seriously spectacular specimens there - 12 foot tall SS02's and Eileen's and all that - growing like mad in the ground.. Zelly bro you should post a pic of that monstrose cutting of what we ascertained was indeed the TPC - under your care it''s turned into a beautiful monstrose cactus, while its parent (the TPC) is pretty much a crest with that one monstrose column on it.. That is the TPC also, just to clarify - not the TPQuasiC.. Anyhow, that cactus is gonna love it over there - Zelly has some old-school farming knowledge going on - crazy rich tilled soil and whatnot - it's a whole different level of growth and health his trichos have than the potted specimens myself and most the rest of us have going..

Yah SAB is mostly Aussies - so if you're in the USA you can receive cuttings from them, but they can't receive cuttings from us.. We can all receive seeds from each other though - just so long as the ones inbound to the USA don't say "Lophophora williamsii" on them ;) Enjoy this journey into the wonderful world of trichocereus, I know I have!

When in doubt, don't name a clone - and most certainly don't ever name a clone the same as an existing clone if you're not absolutely sure! We need to be really sure of things when we go and label an unknown clone as a known clone. Trichos are so variable looking based on environmental factors - lots of bridgesii will look like a Lumberjackus if they're stressed - in fact, in my experience, all bridgesii start to look very similar if they're really stressed and on old growth - you need healthy fresh growth to even begin to be able to tell. That's the problem with cannabis - there's all this debate about the parentage of some of our preeminent strains like OG Kush and Girl Scout Cookies - and unscrupulous breeders label similar looking phenotypes of other strains as "OG" or "GSC" and it fucks everything up because then those get bred with other strains and once that happens you can't go back and the gene pool is irrevocably contaminated.. If you go selling someone a clone that isn't Lumberjackus but looks like it and so you call it "Lumberjackus" - and that person then crosses it with another tricho, calling it "Lumberjackus X pachanoi" or whatever, but it wasn't a Lumberjackus after all - well then, you can see the problem.. Entheogenic cactus breeding is at a much earlier stage than is the cannabis breeding, and we have the chance to do it right - same with hybrid seed - if you think it may have been pollinated by a different father or by multiple fathers - disclose that. I know in my case if there's any chance there was open-pollination I make that clear - such as with the "huarazensis x N1" cross from a few years back - with that one, me and the guy I made the cross with believed it may have been open-pollinated instead due to old N1 pollen we used - So, everybody was told up front it might be open-pollinated and that way people don't breed the progeny with other trichos and say its "huarazensis x N1 x ____ because they don't know for sure and don't want to throw everything off..

Am hoping for some help here - my plants are besieged by at least mealy bugs - they are leaving what look like little silk cocoons all over my houseplants and indoor cacti. I see the mealy bugs also - are they the cause of this or do I have 2 type of pest? I've had root mealies before - but not this silky mess on the leaves and columns of my plants. My beautiful goddamn TPC is dying - sections of it are sort of rotting and drying up and turning brown and crisp - is that the bugs? There is this silky stuff everywhere, on most of my indoor plants. What should I do? thanks!