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Cacti & Succulents

Weird cactus rot.

13 years ago

One of my cacti rotted out on me over the three-week winter vacation in which I was away from my apartment. This strikes me as sort of odd for a couple of reasons:

- It's in a light and well-drained potting mix inside of an unglazed ceramic pot.

- I hadn't watered that recently anyway.

- My apartment got down to maybe 68F while I was away which is hardly cold.

One possible culprit I could suspect is mealies, as it DID have a bit of a mealy infestation. However, I had, to the best of my knowledge, taken care of that, and there wasn't much in the way of prominent damage. Or any visible damage, really. And I still don't see any remaining mealies on it at all.

However, looking back, I remembered that that cactus was always sort of deflated on one side ever since I got it back in May. Never really concerned me because it never felt soft and it didn't LOOK like rot, so I just assumed it was some kind of weird corking. However, that's the exact same spot that suddenly rotted out on me.

So is it possible that this thing's had a fungal infestation for the better part of a year and it just took that long to really go critical..? Or is it possible that the insecticidal soap I was using against the mealies set something off?

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Comments (3)

paracelsus
13 years ago
So is it possible that this thing's had a fungal infestation for the better part of a year and it just took that long to really go critical..?

Yes. I have had this happen, usually first noticed in early spring. Sometimes, a cactus can completely melt inside, leaving a hollow shell behind with no obvious signs of problems. Repotting can sometimes cause 'delayed' infection which slowly festers until the cactus is a hollow shell. Mealy bug infestation could also leave open sores leading to fungal infection.

It's very unlikely that your insecticidal soap solution caused any sort of problem. Try windex or 409 instead, they are surprisingly effective. :-)

Brad
amccour
Original Author
13 years ago
"Repotting can sometimes cause 'delayed' infection which slowly festers until the cactus is a hollow shell. Mealy bug infestation could also leave open sores leading to fungal infection."

I think I noticed this issue WHILE I was repotting it, so I doubt that was what caused it, and the mealy bug infestation was more recent and didn't leave any open sores that I saw (I lost an Astrophytum to mealy induced rot last year). Seems like this was a problem that originated before I bought it. Oh well, least it seems like it wasn't my fault :(

About the repotting-induced-rot thing, though. I left a number of cacti out to dry for a bit after depotting them and prior to repotting them so that any root damage could heal over, especially in cases where depotting had to be more aggressive for various reasons. Good idea, bad idea, or no difference either way? Or is that more of an issue of soil composition?
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Celeste
8 years ago
I'm sure this is kind of a long shot but did you ever figure out what caused this? I'm having the same problem & it's killed off several of my cacti

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