It’s been a slow winter for flowers, but things are changing. I see buds forming here and there, in the greenhouse and in the unheated cloches. It’s been a freakishly warm winter, so far. My “warm” unheated cloche has rarely gone below freezing. Nighttime minimum temperatures in past winters have very commonly been between 10 and 0 F (-14 to -18C). So far, there have been very few nights where the temperature fell to below 20 F (-7 C). This means that there are lots of early flowering species that are starting to do so in the “warm” cloche.

I did manage to transplant every single one of the overcrowded seedlings that I’ve been abusing for so long. I also started in on transplanting to bigger pots many of my 8 year old and older plants. I’m going to try to make a herd of show quality plants, just for the heck of it. Show cacti are usually judged as a plant, since flowering can’t be counted on to be present during a show.

All photos are © 2017 Siegfried N. Lodwig, Ph.D

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