There is an obvious dichotomy between the the desire to produce an update of the now out of print NCL , and waiting for further refinements and fault corrections of the DNA revelations presently known and pending -- I personally would be quite happy to wait a couple of years for these refinements to...

Backeberg would suggest a new genus

No I have not tried it , but I think that it would only be of much use on plants grown in a loamy mix and never allowed to completely dried out , maybe epiphyllums or similar , or plants bedded out I use a gritty mix and plants are dried off for the winter months ( 6 ) which I assume with the large ...

As any of the above , but roughly slicing the fruit and leaving it to soak for a day or two helps to break it up before you start the process . With any of these methods seeds will be lost , but as they are large fruit with plenty of seed , that is of little consequence

I think that it is common misnomer that columnar cacti take up room , in fact they use up less surface space than the larger globular or multi headed plants , indeed if you are short of space ( and many are ) , its possible to place several small pots round the base ( remembering to pick them up reg...

The ones from the Chaco area , chiquitanum , eurypleureum , damsii , stenopleurum are the ones to take in , but most are pretty tough plants ; the trouble is the one winter when it goes a lot colder than -6 c for a length of time and of course you can only be wise after the event ! As with any plant...

I would guess that the longest spines are actually found on the basal trunks of some of the very tall ceroid plants , but in the greenhouse it probably comes down to the ratio of plant body to spine length that impresses . For me that would be some of the Lobivia pentlandii forms , or versicolor , w...

I would add that if the pot has been anywhere in the proximity of your other plants , I would keep a close eye on them , and dose everything when they have started to grow in the spring after the first watering -- unless you have only had the plant for a few days mealies will have been on the lookou...

Looks a bit like a reaction to winter cold to me , although it should be OK down a degree or so lower than zero . I would indeed chop it off and re establish in part because the base looks too small and restricted to take the strain as the plant gets larger and becomes heavy . keep the stump as A. i...

Cellar storage used to be a pretty standard procedure in central Europe I think , its so much colder , wrapping each plant in newspaper . The main problems are the size of the collection , and the internal room available and the time and effort required ; its more or less like moving house every yea...