Interesting looking columnar cacti ID

[mutant]

Well I found these in a multistore and decided to take all 4... You will propably imagine what I hope them to be, but I won't tell, to keep you objective....

I know they are maybe too young to tell, but I thought 'what the heck, let's hear what others have to say' ...

Interesting notes:

*they seem fairly dehydrated, they sure need repotting and watering

*They have green parts in older growth

*They have a mark like V , but rather more horizontal and a depression among the areoles vertically, but I need to water them and see what they finally look like

*they have pretty big spines

Edited December 18, 2008 by mutant

[genki]

is that a flower on one of them?

[ballzac]

Pilocereus azureus

[Ace]

Pilosocereus for sure. Ballz, just a heads up on the spelling - I always used to call/spell it Pilocereus, however I believe it is properly spelled Pilosocereus . My apologies, on second glances in Wiki (I hear the cringes already ), Pilocereus is actually a synonym for Pilosocereus. Google results seem to favour Pilosocereus.

Interesting flower - I dont think I've ever seen one flowering before. Seems a very small height to be flowering too! Dont be discouraged because they were not what you had hoped (I gather) - they are a beautiful species as they are

Edited December 19, 2008 by Ace

[mutant]

LOL, the 'flower' is these phony ones they glue on cacti Pilosocereus azureus flowers are of the trichocereus type and white...

Pity they're not what I hoped for, especially since I bought all 4 of them, but I learnt some more stuff about ID [that is, now I know why they're not trichocereus] , and thankfully, they're regarded as pretty decent as grafting stock, so it's so bad I took all 4 after all It is in my intentiuons to try different stocks and note differences. Opuntia is also of great interest to me, a stock that seems to be overlooked by most...

I read people saying in the nook that one of it's merits is that its sap is very sticky [same as with Opuntia I guess] which is obviously a merit...

I think it's obviously what ballzac suggested, and they seem to be quite pretty when older... In any case, I have more and more blue cacti, so maybe that's what the theme of my cactus garden will be

[Inyan]

Nice grafting stock you have there. I see some merits as yet untapped in these specimens of yours. Keep trucking and get to grafting those little guys.