Today when I was sowing seeds which I already talked about in a previous post, I realized that two of my cactus opened their flowers at the same time, as you may remember we didn't know the ID at the time I bought the cactus, but now with the flower I think everything is different, by the way I had other plans for today's post but truly the beauty of the flowers is superior.
Apparently it is a Lobivia arachnacantha, and although the flower looks red, the truth is that sometimes, depending on where you look at it, it may seem almost purple.
What impresses me the most is that although the cactus is very small, the flowers grow huge, even bigger than the cactus itself, at the moment this little one has this flower, one in the middle of growth and one more that can barely be appreciated.
I guess you remember last year's cactus, the one that deformed and got a little ugly, I have been trying to recover its figure without any success, the only thing I have achieved is that it is full of flower buds, in fact it has five at the moment and what surprised me the most was that they opened their flowers at the same time.
Luckily their flowers are of different color and even different size, for the moment I am thinking that it must be the same family of Lobivia arachnacantha, but what do you think?
By the way, in my spare time I will try to investigate how to pollinate them, maybe they can pollinate themselves or maybe I need to try a cross-pollination to see if I get some hybrid for their different color and size of the flower, if you have an idea I'm all ears.
I'm even thinking that being in the same family as lobivia densispina, I might even try to go crazy with the brush, just like @ewkaw did last year, I still remember that post very clearly in my mind 🤣
Welcom to the Lobivia club. A new entry to my collection from last week. Unfortunately i bought already bloomed. I prefer to be supriced by my cactus! Haha! In any case nice post !
Thanks, by the way your cactus is the black one?
No, its the green one. Just my cell phone's camera is poor 😂
Maybe you don't see it yet but your deformed cactus is recovering nicely, the growth tips look good but the scarring won't leave, just get lower and lower on the body of the cactus.
I don't know much about pollinating cactus: they make their own seeds or not at all at my place
Now that you mention it, it seems to be recovering, I will pay more attention to its growth.
Oh my that red is amazing! They do have beautiful flowers. I also have a yellow one.
Can't help much with the pollination. Mine didn't work :P. But I tried to cross anything that I had in bloom and I was ready it will not work. The two Lobivia should work though. Try! :)
Well I tried it and the flowers seem to have closed pretty soon, I hope it's because the pollination worked haha.