Cactus Monday

This is the first time I'm participating in Cactus Monday, and I wanted to show the progression on a few cacti and one new acquirement.

Here's a mammilaria cactus that's been blooming and producing seeds all summer:


You can see a bright pink seed pod dangling from the cactus, and a few blooms starting to open. Not pictured are the tiny pinhead-sized cacti growing around the base inside the pot. I've harvested a few dried seed pods, crushed, and scattered them in another pot. They'll be going to my old man's cubicle for him to baby.

Next is this specimen cactus that my old man bought this past spring:


It's saying, "PUT UP YER DUKES!"

And here's the tambourine playing hippy side:


It's probably put on 3-4", and it's beginning to worry me. I haven't moved it from it's original pot - just stuck it inside a clay pot for extra stability.

Here are my rescue roadkill cacti that I bought after Christmas:


Wow. They've come a long way. This was my first ever cactus purchase. I bought six 12" pots of very sad looking cactus, cut off the fungus, lopped whole chunks off, pulled off some of the branching, and started whole new cacti growing. The above is the large clumping, and it's probably put on 6-8" of new growth. You can see scarring from what the fungus did.

Here's what this exact same planter looked like back in March:


Here's one I started which has branched magnificently and put on about 12" of new growth:


And here's the new acquirement:

It's a brain cactus, and it just amuses me to no end. The best part is that it's pretty much hardy here, and I placed it in a sheltered section outside along with my other cacti and succulents that need a bit more sheltering than the old prickly pear.

To participate in Cactus Monday, go to Teri's Painted Daisies.