When to transplant cacti?

Every time we go to a nursery, it is easy for our subconscious – or perhaps conscious  – to take us to the section of some beautiful plants that we normally see with thorns that are being grown in mini pots of barely 5,5 cm in diameter. By selling them like this, nurserymen can put low prices on them, making more than one or two of us take more plants than we had in mind.

But what do we do once we get home? We leave them in those pots for years and years thinking, perhaps, that they can survive like this forever, which is not true. So, When to transplant cacti?

Newly bought cacti have to be changed pot. This first transplant is very important, since it is most likely that it has been in the same mini pot for 3, 4 or 5 years, perhaps more depending on the growth rate it has. Even though they have been paying it regularly, the roots have usually taken up all the space they had available and the plants simply cannot continue to grow.

Sometimes it happens that, having no more space, they grow in ways that they should not. For example, a healthy Ferocactus can begin to grow columnar, when its natural shape is that of a globe; columnar, like Pachycereus pringleiThey can be very thin and small, and those who tend to have many suckers or "little arms", like the Rebutia, can be left with a single fleshy body.

But also it will be very important to transplant them again every time we see that the roots come out through the drainage holes, or when the cactus has grown so wide that it has occupied the entire pot. The question is, at what time do you have to change the container?

In spring, just after the risk of frost has passed (it can be March, April or May depending on the weather in our area). We can also do it in summer if we have gone shopping in that season, but only if it is not blooming, since otherwise the flowers could abort and wilt before their time.

If you have any questions, don't leave them unanswered. Ask  .