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Opuntia is the bomb for grafting Trichos


Halcyon Daze

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A while ago I grafted a young tricho seedling onto some Opuntia, I took the first pic at three months but soon after I had to leave it in the care of family for a while. When I came back (at 14 months) I found the rootstock had suffered some major damage and the whole graft was lying on the ground but unscathed and still attached to the Opuntia.

It's now de-grafted and growing happily in it's own pot but here's a look at the progress after 3 months and then again after 14 months. see if you can guess the Tricho it's a hybrid. Needless to say I'm now a big fan of Opuntia as rootstocks.

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graft 3 months.JPG

graft 14 months a.JPG

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graft 14 months c.JPG

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graft 14 months c.JPG

graft 3 months.JPG

graft 14 months a.JPG

graft 14 months b.JPG

graft 14 months c.JPG

Edited by Halcyon Daze
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I experimented with Opuntia tomentosa, Velvety tree pear and it was not real good at all. A couple of serious problems with stock were that it did not like humidity at all so getting micro's to take was a bit treacherous.

Another was that it randomly sealed off the union between stock and scion for no apparent reason, some just after the scion took, others 6 months down the track and every where in between. All were rejected eventually. I have a theory that this opuntia switches into dormancy mode very quickly once the roots start to go dry at which point it sacrifices the scion in favour of hording.

The other main problem was it's susceptibility to cactoblastis. Most of the stocks I used had been attacked within 12 months.

Looks like some opuntia are better than others.

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there was a bit of noise over grafting with opuntia compressa a year or two ago.

seemed it was a great stock to use for fast growth, there was no need to eventually ungraft as you could bury the opuntia and give the impression the scion was growing on own roots plus it was noticed that flowering was achieved in some very young plants.

here's a bit of info on opuntia compressa

http://www.lapshin.org/cultivar/N21/graft-e.htm

http://www.cactus-art.biz/technics/Grafting_on_opuntia_compressa_step_by_step.htm

never tried it myself, i hate glochids

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You will love these

opuntia grafting -

opuntia grafting - http://www.youtube.com/user/DRCEVNL#p/a/u/2/Bda1k09CqaM < especially this one! ;-)

pereskiopsis grafting -

if it aint dutch,... it aint much! hahahaha,.... just me being silly with some dutch arrogance. so not to be taken seriously folks. but you have to admit the vids are nice and professional.

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Cousin pushed me into the prickly pear at Grandmas when I was 10.

I musta been 12 by the time all those evil glochids came out!

Then somehow I thought just the fruits were a good idea to buy at the market last year.

Pretty unqie, if not a kinda flavourless mix of many other fruits..

Then I realised the prick(ly) pear grower didn't explain I needed to use gloves.. wash throroughly.. and quarantine the bastards like ebola

I found this out the hard way, tryna scrape glochids out of the inside of my lips

No..

I think opuntia is a bit like bushfire.

Fine if its naturally occured and no1's around...

but il b fuct if im gonna start or play with one.

Great results tho!

Edited by mud
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damn the glochids in the lips must've killed,

might have to take a few opuntia cuts, running low on peres

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I have experimented with opuntia/Loph and opuntia/astrophytum but never had much luck. They take and plump up a bit but never seen to put on any growth. This is a good result

 

i had the same exact experience, and the opuntia keeps on puppiing like crazy. I decided not to mess with it again, but these are amazing results.

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I've grafted to Opuntia a few times. The grafts took and grew a little, but eventually stalled. The best one put out roots, so I rooted it while it was still attached to the stock, by raising a pot of soil up to the roots. When I moved it got knocked off the stock, but already had a decent root system of its own in the other pot. I still have one on an Opuntia, but it's not doing much (if anything).

https://www.shaman-australis.com/forum/applications/core/interface/imageproxy/imageproxy.php?img=http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6105/6245992462_336ff9c880_b.jpg&key=3ed5f8cfc1c45437e29e945c327d85cf583197970e8155042807646c414e4480

https://www.shaman-australis.com/forum/applications/core/interface/imageproxy/imageproxy.php?img=http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6118/6245992768_2bafe1defb_b.jpg&key=e3b95956c3b192fde7d321a329d6c29af2bf84c9eb2eafd899d7fbf06c8d22b1

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I have found that with opuntia that you only need to cut the very top off the pad to graft and try not to leave a large area to callous. The theory is that you cut just enough to yield vascular tissue and thus the graft is at the absolute extremity of the pad and has less competition from developing pups. The opuntia seems to divert energy away from the graft and eventually bypass the graft altogether if you dont continually cut the pups off but this is par for the course with all grafts really.... just seems to pup badly early on like peres.

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This is the second year for this graft from small pups. No rejection, nice growth and the only pups coming on are on the tip of the 'trunk' pad. I have done quite a few others that i cut mid pad and have rejected no matter how many pups I cut off. Fingers crossed for this one though.

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Edited by Bongchitis
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  • 2 weeks later...

Cousin pushed me into the prickly pear at Grandmas when I was 10.

I musta been 12 by the time all those evil glochids came out!

Then somehow I thought just the fruits were a good idea to buy at the market last year.

Pretty unqie, if not a kinda flavourless mix of many other fruits..

Then I realised the prick(ly) pear grower didn't explain I needed to use gloves.. wash throroughly.. and quarantine the bastards like ebola

I found this out the hard way, tryna scrape glochids out of the inside of my lips

 

laughed my ass off so bloody hard...Ive had several nasty encounters with my microdasys, and i must say i can relate.....but the mouth and lips...i lost my shit!

sorry at laughing at your misfortune Mud

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  • 4 months later...

UPDATE!!! Believe it or not this is not the same graft, it is graft number 2 from the same cactus that started growing after the first graft fell off, aka Apical dominance. I just repotted the whole thing today.

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It really started 'Blue-ing up" in the late afternoon light

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4 g .JPG

Edited by Halcyon Daze
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You can see it in the original photo, but it never really grew untill the bigger graft was gone. It has taken about 6 months to go from the size of a large grape to this.

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So now I really want to look after the Opuntia and multiply it. Any tips on how best to go about doing this for my one and only, most favourite Opuntia? I'm not even sure what species it is now or where it was originally collected from.

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Edited by Halcyon Daze
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They are some lovely plants you have there!

I haven't become game enough yet to attempt grafting but just a quick question.. Is it harder to align the rings on an Opuntia because it is not circular?

Like I said I haven't tried yet so excuse my naievity

RF

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Nice topic

I have got some O.compressa, but havent tried them yet.

The lady in the dutch grafting thing is amazing, she seems to be immune to glochids!

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