I grow Schick hybrids, most are not as tall as that one, and darker green, though the spines and ribs seem the same, and the Schick hybrids do have all of the species in them that is mentioned above, including Rebutia. Well not quiet all of them. And they can be figured out by the flower, if you have the flower chart in color to do so. Keep your labels make duplicate copies of them, and put one in the bottom of the pot. Not all of them look alike, some hardly have any spines, and others have long ones, Bob Schick used to tell them apart by looking at them. Sorry for such a long post, Echinopsis are grown just like any other cactus and need the same care, for flowering give them a low 0-20-10 fertilizer approx. The middle number must be higher, the first number very low. No water in the Winter, they must have the chill and dormant periods to flower. They are extremely hardy, will flower 6 mo. at least of the year from the end of April to the end of Sept. depending on you climate, light where you grow them, feeding. May open 4 nights depending on light. Norma

I've been feeding them with compost tea when I water twice each day. Like most tap water, mine has a a fairly high pH, so minerals may not be as available to the plants as they should be. I try to avoid all toxic stuff, but I do use non-organic fertilizers when my compost for tea is either used up or washed out. I mainly compost maple tree leaves and grass clippings that I bag with the mower each fall. I gave the plants dose of Epson salts and bought a small package of Miracid fertilizer with trace elements. I'm going to try adding a small bit of this each day with their water to lower the pH and supplement their feed now that I am running out of compost that is not already washed out. The rate of leaves dying has slowed down a bit, so it looks like the plant might survive to give me a fall crop after the weather cools down a bit. I am not sure if the improvement is because our temp for the past week has finally dropped from over 100 to the high 80s. It may also be that the sick leaves are the left over ones from before I got rid of the last few aphids and mites. I cannot find a single aphid or mite anymore. It cannot tell for sure which growth on the plant as emerged since the final bugs were beaten. I did take some of the leaves and hold them up to a flash light last night to see if there were any pin-holes. The leaves that have any yellow all seem to have some tiny holes that light would shine through, but the newer mature leaves do not have any holes or yellow. Thank you for the suggestion regarding the magnesium. Between the Epson Salts, more balanced pH, lower temp, and beneficial bugs, I hope somethings works. If I can get this problem with leave drop fixed, I think I can get a good fall crop. The plant's basic stems and roots seem to still be very healthy and there is enough new growth with leaves to still produce a good crop once our night temps drop back below 70 so my blooms will set fruit. Knoxville is near the mountains, but down in river valley, so our cool fall temps are moderated. Last year, I was able to cover my plants with a sheet at night for the first 3 or 4 frosts, and then we got a warm spell without more frost until mid November. After I gave up and picked the green fruit before our first really cold night, I had ripe tomatoes until nearly Christmas. Between tress and my 4 dogs which love to dig, I had a hard time finding a good place to grow a couple of tomato plants, so I've grown 2 or 3 in pots for the past few years. I read about the Topsy-Turvey tomato planters that a local man had invented, so I decided to try the idea 2 years ago. For anyone that wants to grow tomatoes next year in a container, I recommend the idea highly. I don't have to stake them and the plants are clean and dry up off the ground. I'm disabled and living on social security, so I try to make do with things I can scavenge whenever possible. For my planters, I use a 5 or 10 gallon bucket. I tied a strong nylon rope around the top of the buckets, because I did not trust the handles to be strong enough to support both the bucket's contents and the plant's growth. I drilled a 2 inch hole in the center of the bottom of the buckets. When I transplant my seedlings, I sit the bucket right-side-up on the edge of a table with part hanging over the edge so I can get to the hole in the bottom. I slide the plant's roots up from the bottom through the hole in the bucket and then wedged soft sponge-like foam around the plant's stem to keep it from falling out and keep the dirt from running out when I add it next. After the tomato plant is in the hole with its foam collar, I reach in the top of the bucket and pull the plant's roots and stem up into the bucket until only the top stems and leaves of the plant are hanging out of the bottom of the bucket. I then add enough dirt to hold the plant in position. Pause before adding so much dirt that the bucket gets too heavy to lift up to hang. Warning, this thing will get heavy, so a simple cup hook screwed into the overhang will not be enough to hold it once you get it full of dirt, watered, with several feet of foliage. While it is somewhat clumsy to put together, if you have a place to hang it that gets lots of sun, it works great. I was lucky in that someone in the past had already put up a mounting for a swing on the porch. The porch is so sunny, it lends itself better for container gardening than it does for a porch swing, so I use the heavy hooks intended for a porch swing with two adults, to instead support large hanging tomato plants. After I have the pots hanging, I then finish filling the buckets with a mixture of compost and potting mix. I use fresh potting mix each year and wash the buckets with bleach each spring to avoid soil borne diseases and pests from the prior year. In full sun and heat, I water the plants each morning and afternoon. As the stems grow, they will tend to curve back upward in graceful "swooping" arcs that almost hide the bucket they are growing in. Once the plants are heavy with full-sized fruit they will hang more straight, so try to put the pot as high as you can, and still be able to reach up to water it from the top. Cherry tomatoes plants make a very beautiful hanging plant when grown this way. The graceful arcs of lush green leaves are accented so well by the clusters of ripe fruit, you would be tempted to leave then on the plant for decoration, if they weren't so tasty. They are so good, that many of them never even make it inside the house, because I cannot resist picking a few to eat fresh from the vine, every time I go outside and walk past them. While they don't produce bragging sized fruit, I always plant a cherry tomato plant because they are so predictably productive. For me, they always seem to be the most disease and pest resistant and best at continuing to set fruit during the hot summer. Greg

Pry the flower and glue off. By gluing together the top of the plant, which is where the new growth comes from, the plant's ability to grow normally is severely restricted. You can see that in the picture- all the little bumps are being pulled together instead of spreading apart as the cactus grows. I've had good luck gently and slowly prying up the edges of the glue so that it comes off without too much damage to the plant and spines. If you can't get a grip with your fingers because of the spines, try tweezers. Sometimes, though, the glue just won't come off the spines and I have to snip them with scissors. I try very much to avoid any damage to the plant body itself (the green part). It looks like it's in a very peaty mix, so yes, repotting would be a good idea. A good starting place is to mix commercial cactus and succulent soil 50:50 with perlite to get better drainage. If you search on here for "soil mix" or "gritty mix" or "why is my cactus not doing well", there are a ton of threads discussing this. The good news is you've kept it alive for four months! Great!

Oh boy this sucks;)! Euphorbia ingens are cold hardy down to about 28F. So from now on these will need to be protected during the coldest days and nights. I think you've learned that lesson;). Somebody should have made you aware of this when you purchased them. You live in a zone where the temps get down to 10F-15F so the seller should have least tried to sell you frost cloths at the time of purchase. I'm sure those Euphorbias were not cheap. This is tough a one because they're big and the pics aren't very clear. So it's hard to tell what's going on. The areas that look bad are they mushy? Regardless if they are mushy or not there is frost damage. The growth tip is destroyed. So those parts will no longer grow, but will branch on the sides:). So one of two things will happen or a little bit of both. The areas that have been damaged will either dry up like this. The above pic shows frost damage on my Euphorbia grandicornis from last winter. See how the damage just stopped and dried up. I probably will cut eventually. Or the damaged areas will get mushy and spread. Luckily your Euphorbias are on the bigger side so you can kind of wait and see. Keep a close eye on them. Watch for changes. I honestly wouldn't chop quite yet. Wait and see how things play out. If you notice things take a turn for the worse you will have to cut:(. E. ingens can take temps down to 28F, but for most of my plants I don't like to let them go as low as they can go. At least without some major protection. Any growth tips you see that don't have any damage cover with styrofoam cups or similar. This will help protect them. Heck I would even cover the damaged tips;). Then cover with the frost cloth. I know I didn't give that much advice, but this is exactly what I would do. I just think if you go and chop now it may be a little premature. I mean there is definitely damage, but I would just wait and see what the Euphorbias will do.