Hey guys... I've decided to grow a lil cactus farm for fun. I need a lot of advice. I've researched some info online about how to grow cactii but I could use some help for my specific situation. Any advice you can give would be appreciated thanks I've attached a few images of the soil and device I'm going to be growing them in... I had a few questions. 1. I heard that you need to keep the humidity high for the first few weeks, so I'm going to keep the plastic lid on, but don't the cactii need air? Should I put holes in the lid? Or should I just air it out once a day and mist everything? 2. How much should I mist? Or should I just use my gut instinct? 3. The mouth of each little box is about the size of padlock... seeing that I'm ordering 325 seeds, and that I only have 50 little boxes. Should I put a few in each one? How many should I put in each one? 4. I don't have a microwave. How else can I sterilize the soil? Any other tips would be appreciated!! Thanks! PS: I'm blogging about it too if anyone is interested in my progress.. it's entheogen dot tk PSS: Anybody know any forums that would be really suitable for this kind of advice?
A couple of cactus growing guides: http://www.cactus-mall.com/ccc/ http://www.xs4all.nl/~knehnav/cultivation.htm You should maybe consider to mix the cactus soil with some perlite (60/40). I will be looking forward to follow your little project on the blog.
1. I think you could either air the box out or make a few holes. Making a few holes would be lower maintenance, and obviously you wouldn't want so many holes that your cacti would dry out, but opening the box every now and then would work as well. 2. Just use your gut instinct. You don't want puddles of water building on your soil surface so that your seedlings will drown, but you don't want to let the soil get completely dry either. 3. You could put a few seeds in each box - if you put too many you might later on have problems with separating the cacti from each other. You can definitely put maybe 5-10 seeds evenly spaced in one box, though. Most likely not all of the seeds will sprout, and they don't need to be moved from one another before they are close to colliding. 4. I've read that you can also bake the soil in the oven. Generally soil is pretty much ready to go right out of the bag - sterilizing isn't as necessary as if you would be making your own soil mix from collected ingredients. Here is a guide for sterilizing soil using the oven: http://www.ehow.com/how_2060243_sterilize-potting-soil.html You may not want to follow that guide to a T, but it gives you a basic idea.
