Cactus Culture For Amateurs | Page 8

position against the south wall of a house, greenhouse, or shed,
and against this wall construct a raised rockery of brick rubble, lime
rubbish, stones (soft sandstone, if possible), and fibrous loam. The
rockery when finished should be, say, 4 ft. wide, and reach along the
wall as far as required; the back of the rockery would extend about 2 ft.
above the ground level, and fall towards the front. Fix in the wall, 1 ft.
or so above the rockery, a number of hooks at intervals all along, to
hold in position lights sufficiently long to cover the rockery from the
wall to the front, where they could be supported by short posts driven
in the ground. The lights should be removed during summer to some
shed, and brought out for use on the approach of winter. Treated in this
manner, the following hardy species could not fail to be a success:
Opuntia Rafinesquii and var. arkansana, O. vulgaris, O. brachyarthra, O.
Picolominiana, O. missouriensis, O. humilis, Cereus Fendleri, C.
Engelmanni, C. gonacanthus, C. phoeniceus, Echinocactus Simpsoni, E.
Pentlandii, Mamillaria vivipara.
Having briefly pointed out the various positions in which Cactuses may
be cultivated successfully, we will now proceed to treat in detail the
various operations which are considered as being of more or less
importance in their management. These are potting, watering, and
temperatures, after which propagation by means of seeds, cuttings, and

grafting, hybridisation, seed saving, &c., and diseases and noxious
insects will be treated upon.
Soil.--The conditions in which plants grow naturally, are what we
usually try to imitate for their cultivation artificially. At all events, such
is supposed to be theoretically right, however difficult we may often
find it to be in practice. Soil in some form or other is necessary to the
healthy existence of all plants; and we know that the nature of the soil
varies with that of the plants growing in it, or, in other words, certain
soils are necessary to certain plants, whether in a state of nature or
cultivated in gardens. But, whilst admitting that Nature, when
intelligently followed, would not lead us far astray, we must be careful
not to follow her too strictly when dealing with the management of
plants in gardens. There are other circumstances besides the nature of
the soil by which plants are influenced. Soil is only one of the
conditions on which plants depend, and where the other conditions are
not exactly the same in our gardens as in nature, it is often found
necessary to employ a different soil from that in which the plants grow
when wild.
It has been stated that plants do not grow naturally in the soil best
suited for them, and that the reason why many plants are found in
peculiar places is not at all because they prefer them, but because they
alone are capable of existing there, or because they take refuge there
from the inroads of stouter neighbours who would destroy them or
crowd them out. There are, as every gardener knows, numerous plants
that succeed equally well in widely different soils, and a soil which
may be suitable for a plant in one place, may prove totally unsuited in
another. Hence it is why we find one gardener recommending one kind
of soil, and another a different one, for the same plant, both answering
equally well because of other conditions fitting better with each soil.
This helps us to understand how it is that many garden subjects grow
much better when planted in composts often quite different from those
the plants are found in when wild. Few plants have a particular
predilection for soil, and some have what we may call the power to
adapt themselves to conditions often widely different.
In Cactuses we have a family of plants for which special conditions are
necessary; and, as regards soil, whether we are guided by nature or by
gardening experience, we are led to conclude that almost all of them

thrive only when planted in one kind, that soil being principally loam.
Plants which are limited in nature to sandy, sun-scorched plains or the
glaring sides of rocky hills and mountains, where scarcely any other
form of vegetation can exist, are not likely to require much decayed
vegetable humus, but must obtain their food from inorganic substances,
such as loam, sand, or lime. So it is with them when grown in our
houses. They are healthiest and longest-lived when planted in a loamy
soil; and although they may be grown fairly well for a time when
placed in a compost of loam and leaf mould, or loam and peat, yet the
growth they make is generally too sappy and weak; it is simply fat
without bone, which, when the necessary resting period comes round,
either rots