I repotted my Astrophytum seedlings on Tuesday into much more spacious pots. They were so crammed, about 7-9 seedlings per 5 cm square pot, so much so that some of the Onzuka's were getting a bit tall. Hopefully this will give them a growth spurt for the summer ahead. They are about 14 months old








Also repotted 2 caput's that were sharing a pot with 2 other kabutos but one one of them rotted.
They were growing so well too. The good news (I hope) is that I grafted one of the tubercles which was about 5cm long. The other tubercle started to rot right through even though it was still quite turgid.

I cut the good tubercle into 4 sections and grafted two sections onto one Tricho pachanoi and one each onto pereskiopsis. No photos yet as their still a bit fragile and in their humidity chamber.

Seedlings are looking good Cactusboy, There is some good variety.
I look forward to seeing some of your grafting attempts.
I hope they work out, I know the stress and worry your feeling.

WOW. Nice Seedlings

realy, i see some realy promising seedling! especialy on the cabuto's pot!
an the onzuka's pot the quadricostatu are realy interesting!

There are a few good ones there and I was so tempted to graft some of the more heavy flecking ones but I think I will leave them be. I hope they turn out to look like what they are suppose to.

These were my first attempt at growing Astros from seed and I only wish I had started growing them years earlier instead of concentrating on Arios. Would have sowed between 3000-4000 Ario seeds over the past few years with very little to show.

Here's my only remaining Astro caput-medusae from my first batch of 5 seeds sown about 14 months ago that I repotted the same day. Hope it survives because the seeds were not cheap. Could have probably bought the same size plant with what i paid for the seeds. Still have 4 very young ones (different source, cheaper seed) that are starting to show their first turbercle but I grafted one of those today.




Also repotted these Arios a few days ago. They were sown in late 2005. They are mostly fissuratus (on the left), hintonni (middle) and a couple of kotchs and Obregonias scattered about. That pots under two layers of 70% shade-cloth now with a couple of pots a retuses (same age) that really appreciate the filtered sunlight.




A close-up

Too bad about the ario's, I find them a double edged sword so to speak. When small they require constant monitoring and they are effected by even slight changes in environment. On the other hand once they reach about 1.5 - 3 yrs, depending on sp and conditions, they do a 360 and no longer require any attention at all, I sometimes forget I have them



Good to see another person with a good interest in Astro's, I really like the diversity and supernatural ability to hybrid them

Good luck with your seedlings and keep us posted on their progression.

Also does the seeling in the first picture top row second from the left, look like it could be mildly variegated

HN

The astros look great! i really like the 3 ribbed myriostigma.
and nice Digitostigma too.

wow baby astro's looking so cute!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!