Transcript:
Hello, everybody! Welcome to caucus caffeine. My name is Anna today. I am very fortunate to have my Mckenna serious, rigid Decimus in flour and I have two cactus That are in flower today, and I just realized that I think I have two different types of this rainbow. Hedgehog, that is the more common name of this cactus. Because as you can see on the flower, one is lighter, pink in color. And then the other one is brighter. Pink one is smaller and this one is bigger, so I do think that I have two different kinds of subspecies of this akeno serious right here. And I did Look it up in the Internet, and that’s when I found out that there are several types of subspecies of this rainbow Hedgehog. If you will also notice the pollen, this one has a dark orange color, almost red, while this one has a yellow pollen. So I I believe they are different, although I did not know that until today, even on the spines. If I could just take a closer shot of the spines, they are also slightly different, so I’m not exactly sure what kind of subspecies I have here because I get conflicting information in the Internet as to how to differentiate each one of them, but it doesn’t matter and they both look so pretty, so I’ll just call them Rainbow. Hedgehog, the flowers also last for two to three days. This one is the second that it has opened. This is the first day, but the longest that. I’ve had this flowers open in the past is three days. It would close in the evening or in the afternoon, but in the morning they would reopen. So a little bit about this cactus. The first thing that I can tell you is. This cactus loves sunlight. So if you have this give it plenty of sunshine, its spines are actually designed to cover its body, so that’s how it protects its body from the sunlight, and I find it better In terms of the coloration of the spines, the more Sun, it gets the more brighter red spines that you’ll get in the winter when this gets less sunlight, the spines are rather pale looking, but in spring and summer, they color up pretty well in terms of water. Be a little stingy on the watering because this can be rot prone, so its body stores a lot of water, so it doesn’t need to be watered as often. In fact, this is one of the cactus that it that can go very long time without watering under my care, take note. I do live in a desert. I live in Las Vegas So it is very dry and arid here so but this cactus can take a long time like weeks without watering and it will be perfectly fine in winter. I keep this. I keep this totally dry. I do not water it at all, and it would shrink a little bit, but not too much, but they prefer a very dry winter. In fact, I think the more I stress these guys in the winter with being dry and cold, the better flowering I get during the summer, so with that being said, I would suggest that you use a very well draining and very gritty soil. When you have this cactus, it likes dry and arid environment, but if you live in a more humid environment, just make sure that you use a very well draining soil because this can be rot prone. This can take freezing temperatures for a short period of time. They are very, very Hardy. Our temperature here in the desert can go down to 27 to 28 degrees Fahrenheit. During the winter and in the summer, we could go up as high as 115 degrees Fahrenheit. And I do have these guys outside all year round. I even have a couple that is planted in my garden, my desert garden and they were out there perfectly fine, surviving the very hot summer and the very cold winter that we have here in. Las Vegas, Okay, so for pests. I’ve been very fortunate so far and I can would not to have any pest problems with this cactus. Although, like any other cactus, this would also be susceptible to mealy bugs and spider mites. So just be very careful with that. The only I would say we’ll, not really pass, but the only problem that I’ve had in the past with this and with my other types of cactus or Birds. Some of the birds tend to eat the fruits or the seed pods. They would pick it before. I had a chance to, you know, Harvest them, so it’s for me. It’s just a bird, so it’s not really a big deal in terms of propagation. This cactus rarely offsets or forms branches, so usually it is solitary, so the best bet that you can have in terms of propagating. This cactus is through seeds or by seeds, So I have tried pollinating this last year and have had seeds and I was able to plant the seeds and germinate them. So I’m gonna show you the seeds or the seedlings that I have right now. So in terms of germinating the seeds, I find the germinating them rather easy compared to other seeds, so these are about three week old seedlings, so they started germinating after I would say between 7 to 10 days when the first seedlings started sprouting and I have another one here, That’s a little bit older. These are nine months old seedlings well. I have a variety of ceilings here, but this green ones are the rainbow Hedgehog seedlings so pretty interesting how they look very different as seedlings. So I wonder when they will start getting the red color on their body, but I can see the spines starting to have that fan like look on them, so that would be it for now. So if you guys happen to find one of these cactus? I highly recommend it because it is very pretty weather without the flowers. This cactus is very attractive. If you liked this video, don’t forget to give me a thumbs up. Subscribe if you like cactus and other desert plants so. I’ll see you in my next video again. Guys, bye and years !