How to make an Outdoor Cactus Garden

 

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Although it is more satisfying to grow flowers and plants in the house and plants like cacti must be grown indoors for almost part of the year. However, like birds belong in the fields and trees, cacti, or just about any other plant, belong in the natural environment. True cacti lovers do their best to give their plants the opportunity of enjoying living in an outdoor garden for least half of the year. The good news is that growing an Outdoor Cactus Garden is actually easy and inexpensive.

You can grow a modest yet satisfactory outdoor cactus garden even in a very small space. As many as 50 medium-sized cacti can be accommodated in 3 ft. wide by 5 ft. long place, and each cactus you plant will give you constant pleasure. Depending on how many cacti you want to plant, the size of your outdoor cactus garden will vary accordingly. Before you begin planting an outdoor cactus garden, make sure you plan it out. Cactus gardens can be built in various shapes.

If you live in a colder region, then you can plan cacti plants by keeping them in flower pots the whole year. However, keep in mind that some cacti can resist low temperatures with dry air quite surprisingly, while others are not able to withstand the winters. Thus, cacti kept in flowering pots can be conveniently moved according to the weather and their roots are not disturbed. This will also make it easier to move the plants where there is plenty of fresh air and sunlight.

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Outdoor Cactus Garden

Different species of cacti have different moisture and soil requirements. In an outdoor cactus garden, treating the plants individually in their separate pots will allow you to easily supply these requirements. Some might need some extra water, some a little fresh soil and others might spoonful more of lime. If you have planted your cacti in separate containers, then you won't affect the others while treating one.

While a cactus garden can also be planted in a considerable plot of ground, but securing proper draining becomes easier in flower pots. Using flower pots also helps avoid water-logged soil during continuous, long rainy spells. It is easier to take cacti for examination, treatment and re-planting, whenever necessary, if they are growing in pots.

When planting cacti, it is also important to choose the right species that will grow well in your area. You can easily find this information while buying cacti to plant for your outdoor cactus garden. If the temperature where you live falls below 45 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter, then you can still have a cactus garden by planting your cacti along with their pot, in the ground.

The great thing about growing an outdoor cactus garden is that very little maintenance is needed. You won't have to irrigate or water the garden, the rainfall will be sufficient enough. Once a year during the spring, you will simply have to feed your cacti with 10-10-10 and that is just about it. This is why it was mentioned earlier that growing a cactus garden is not as difficult as it might seem.

Do you know about the Nutritional Value of Cactus Fruit

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Most people don't even know that cacti do produce fruits, leave alone edible fruits. Well, fact is the do produce fruits and some fruits are edible. Other uses of cacti fruits include manufacture of intoxicants, dyes, earthen walls, detergents and drugs. Opuntia is the most prolific genus in the family Cactaceae for producing edible cacti fruits. The most common culinary species is the O. ficus-indica that produces fruits which are sometimes referred to as "prickly pears".

Cactus growing has been lately highly commercialized due to the realization of the above named applications. Most gardeners are however also involved in small scale production of cactus fruits in pursuit to its culinary benefits. Growing cactus in your home garden can be pretty easy and fun too. The following are tips for caring and preparing cactus fruits whether you intend to use them as food or as ornamental plants with their showy pink/red flowers and colorful purple/red fruits.

Cactus planting/propagation:

Cactus can be propagated both from cuttings and seeds. Seed propagations it however recommended for home and small scale gardeners.

Buy the commercially available cactus seeds of your choice or better still acquire the seeds from the previous mature plant.

If you are preparing the seeds at home ensure that the pods are mature and ready before harvesting the seed. Choose to harvest when the flower dies off but just before the pod dries.

Remove the mature seeds either by slicing the pods opens with a sharp razor or by twisting them a little.

Prepare your garden by finely tilling it and incorporate organic manure if available. Prickly pear cacti prefer sandy soils, if you can, incorporate a little sandy soil in the top soil of the garden.

Sow the seeds evenly in a finely tilled garden and water daily. The seeds germinate after 4 to 6 week.
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Nutritional Value of Cactus Fruit

Green cactus pear contains around 40 calories and is low in cholesterol and sodium. The Nutritional Value of Cactus Fruit of both the green and the red/purple cactus are rich in vitamin C and magnesium and are currently being studied for the possibility of hangover and high blood pressure treatment.
Mature cacti fruits are normally purple, reddish-orange or deep purple in skin color. When preparing cactus fruit, handle with protection, possible tongs and gloves to avoid injury. You can swirl them in a plastic colander for about three minutes to remove the spines
cut both ends off the fruit and then cut longitudinally to remove the skin
The inner pear pulp can be eaten directly or used to make jelly, jam, candy or wine.

How to Grow Miniature Cactus

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Miniature cactus types are great to be kept both indoors and outdoors. They are low maintenance. Their thick and round stems allow them to store water. They also occupy a minimal surface area. This is a great advantage because once you fall in love with these succulents, you will want to collect more. You can bring them outside during hot summer days, but be sure to put them inside on cold winter days or they will die.

If you are planning to Grow Miniature Cactus indoors, choose the sunniest part of your house. It should preferably be near a window, so it can get the maximum sunlight. If you are going to plant it outside in the garden, make sure that no taller plants obstruct it from receiving sunshine.

To Grow Miniature Cactus in a pot needs to be turned at least once a week. This keeps all sides of the cactus evenly illuminated. These plants produce colorful and fragrant flowers. When they are in bloom, do not move or turn them so that the flowers will not drop and fall.

Majority of the miniature cactus types has the desert as their natural habitat. It is amazing to know that despite this fact, they do get sunburned. Before moving your indoor cactus out, acclimatize it. Keep it in a shade for a week before planting it in the open air. If you notice a change in its pigmentation, either turning lighter or darker than its original color, it might be getting sunburned. Move it to a shady area before it shrivels.

Grow Miniature Cactus

These succulents need minimal watering. With a small stick, poke and prod the soil before watering it to check if it is totally dry. If it is, soak the cactus and the soil. Moist soil does not need watering because it just promotes fungal infection and will eventually lead to rotting.

Wide, unglazed clay pots that are not too large are perfect for your succulents because their roots tend to grow out laterally. Once you choose a pot, stick to it. Cactus does not thrive well with frequent transfers and handling. Layer the bottom of your pot with fine gravel, then top off with a soil that is alkaline and porous with good drainage and aeration. There is available cactus soil sold in the market. They are kind of pricey. So if you want to penny pinch, why not make your own? Just mix equal parts of commercial potting soil with builders sand. You can also add bone meal and ground limestone to this mixture.

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Two of the most common miniature cactus types are the button cactus and the rainbow cactus. The button cactus (Epithelantha unguispina) is tiny and grows up to 4 inches only. It is globular in shape and has beautiful light pink flowers, which then eventually become hot pink colored fruits. The rainbow cactus (Echinocereus rigidissimus), on the other hand, grows solitary and rarely exhibits branches. Its band of spine changes into a different color each year. It has a bright pink flower with a throat of a lighter color and has a greenish or purplish fruit.

You can never go wrong when caring for a cactus. All they need is just lots of sunshine and occasional water. Since miniature cactus types are well known for their spines, be sure to use a tong to handle the smaller ones or wrap the bigger ones in a newspaper when handling them.

Top 12 Types of Flowering Cactus

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Though there are numerous Types of Flowering Cactus, here is a list of Top 12 Types of Flowering Cactus

Barrel Cactus

All members of the ferocactus genus species have a barrel like cylindrical shape with long thorns. The flowers grow up to five or six inches in width. Some types of barrel cacti are:

The California or Compass Barrel Cactus:

This California or Compass Barrel Cactus is about four to eight feet tall with red colored ribs and curves. It produces bell shaped orange to yellow flowers.

Arizona or Wislizenus barrel cactus:

This Arizona or Wislizenus barrel cactus is often globule shaped when young and lengthened after it reaches one foot in diameter. This cactus has many white spines arranged like rays or the radii of a circle and normally grows to a height of about four to eleven feet. The flowers are yellow, red or orange and it usually blooms from July to September.

Sonora (Coville) barrel cactus:

Sonora (Coville) barrel cactus has colored spines and a purple look when it is young. This cactus can grow up to eight feet. The flowers are maroon, orange or yellow and bloom in July or August.

Texas barrel cactus

Texas barrel cactus is a small, globe shaped cactus, which is mostly green but may appear purple in direct sunlight. The central spine could be as long as six inches while the flowers are yellowish with red base. It blooms between May and July. It's one of the shortest type of barrel cacti which grows up to sixteen inches in height

Christmas Cactus

Not truly a cactus at all but a succulent. Still, it has beautiful flowers and can make for a great, low maintenance house plant.

Hedgehog Cactus

Strawberry hedgehog cactus: Its stems can grow two to four inches in diameter and four to twelve inches tall. The flowers are lavender, purple or bright pink and measure up to three inches in diameter and two to three inches long. They bloom in spring. The flowers tend to close at night while opening during the day. The plant normally grows six to eight feet tall.

Arizona hedgehog cactus:

It's a mounding cactus forming from only a few to numerous stems. The flowers have a funnel like shape, bloom between April and June as well as attract hummingbirds. The blooms would remain open for two or three days. The plant can grow up to 21/2 feet tall.

Crimson hedgehog cactus

Crimson hedgehog cactus is another small cactus. The cactus can grow up to one foot long, has no leaves and tends to bloom deep red flowers with petals that form a cup-like shape. It blooms between April and June while remaining open both day and night.

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Bunny ears cactus

Bunny ears cactus has thorny pears lying flat on the ground. It could grow up to 2 feet in height, bloom in mid-spring and the flowers are chartreuse or yellow.

Grizzly bear cactus

Grizzly bear cactus has reddish purple or green stems and black, gray, red-brown, brown, yellow or white spines. The spines can turn from gray to dark-brown then to black as the cactus ages. The plant can grow from six to eighteen inches in height.

Fishhook Pincushion Cactus

Fishhook Pincushion Cactus is a small cactus measuring just six inches or even less in height. Its spines tend to grow thickly on the ground that it's quite difficult to spot the green cactus below it. Around five days after the first summer rain, this plant produces bright-pink flowers with a yellow center. This cactus produces 2 or 3 flower batches during the summer. Fishhook pincushion cacti utilize other plants to cover it from harsh frost, wind or summer. Therefore, it's found under larger plants and trees.

The most common types of Indoor Cactus

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Cacti species of plants are well adapted to grow indoors where the levels of humidity are low. Furthermore, they are low maintenance plants; they require only small quantities of water, fertilizer and sunlight for them to grow. Below are some of the most common types of Indoor Cactus:

Hedgehog Cactus

The hedgehog cactus is an exceptional plant for your patio, and grows well in the drier southern climates. It small in size and produces radiant pink flowers during spring which mature into about 2.5 centimeter edible fruits. This type of cactus is also columnar and sprouts 10-15 closely packed clumps. While individual columns can grow up to one foot tall, their average heights do not exceed six inches. Just as the animal, hedgehog, this cactus is covered in of 2-3 inch long spines which appear in groups of four to six spines.

Old Man Cactus

The old man cactus is a popular houseplant that has its origin in Mexico. It is a columnar cactus renowned for its white wispy hair coverings that resemble those of an elderly, white haired man. This hair covering is a special adaptation to protect the plant from the extremely hot Mexican temperatures. In its native habitat, the old man cactus can grow up to 40-feet tall but it matures slowly when planted indoors, remaining manageable for several years.

Tom-Thumb Cactus

The tom-thumb cactus is thrives well in light shade surroundings, and is best planted in its own small pot. It is globe or column shaped with a height of 10 centimeters and a width of 7 centimeters. The tom-thumb cactus also features about 20 vertically inclined ribs, with each rib having about 10 emerging spines that surround the entire body of the cactus. Its large pink and yellow flowers blossom during spring.

Star Cactus Species

This type of cactus refers to a number of related species that include: the Sand Dollar cactus and the Bishop's Cap cactus. The Bishop's cactus emerges as a globe shape, but assumes a columnar shape as it grows older. It can grow to up to 8 inches tall, has lengthy arching spines and generates eye-catching golden yellow flowers during the mid-summer. The bishop cactus grows well indoors, but requires abundant quantities of sunlight.

The Sand Dollar cactus

The Sand Dollar cactus (Sea Urchin Cactus) is a spineless cactus in the shape of a globe that grows well indoors. Every year, it produces huge and shiny yellow flowers. During the dry season, if flattens into a circular shape making it look like a sand dollar.

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The Rat Tail's Cactus

This cactus has long strands of drooping tough flesh, and produces pink flowers that emerge at the bottom of each of strand. It can grow to a height of about 20 inches and can tolerate shade to some extent, but blooms radiantly when exposed to the sun.

Living Rock Cactus

This species of cactus matures slowly and requires very minimal quantities of water for it to survive. It best planted in sandy soils. The living rock cactus can grow to up to 4 inches tall, and contains several spiky lobes that cover the center of the plant. Ensure that the plant is not overwatered because this easily causes root rot. It is mandatory to repot the plant after every four years.

Small Garden Ideas: How to Get Started

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When looking for small garden ideas, many people jump online or browse magazines to get inspiration. Then armed with an exciting array of new ideas they jump into the project enthusiastically only to realize later that those ideas won’t work with their current landscape setup and they have to abandon the project. If you have small garden ideas for your yard, it’s a good idea to ask yourself a few key questions before you get started to save yourself time, trouble and money on your next landscaping project.

When professional landscape architects take a look at a new project, the first thing they want to do is develop a conceptual plan with the homeowner. There is fancy computer software to do this but most often a simple hand-sketched drawing will do just fine. This conceptual plan will lay out what is to be done, break down the project into the specific steps to be completed and specify the order in which those steps are to be completed.

This way you begin the project with the end in mind so the process of getting to your goal of a beautiful garden is more smooth and enjoyable. Another benefit of a properly constructed conceptual plan for your small garden ideas is that once the plan is outlined, you can tackle certain steps in the plan and not the entire project at once. This can be very handy if you can’t afford to complete the full project with all of your small garden ideas at one time or if you run into a weather constraint due to the changing of seasons making it difficult to plant or excavate.

What is the first question you should ask when designing a conceptual plan around your small garden ideas?

One very important consideration in designing a small garden is the concept of location. Where your small garden is located in relation to the house has a significant impact on what you will want to plan there.

To get the best results, ask yourself which direction the garden is facing. Different plants, flowers, grasses and trees will thrive under different conditions and by knowing which direction the garden will face, you will be able to incorporate the best plant choices into your small garden design.

For a small garden that faces north, planting can be a challenge for many homes. Northern exposure tends to be difficult for a small garden because many plants have a hard time growing in this filtered light environment or will grow but not bloom and thrive.

Good plant choices for a small North-facing garden would be: shade loving plants like Rhododendrons and Camellias as well as, heuchera, autumn fern, and hydrangea. Avoid tropical plants and most grasses that thrive in direct sunlight.

For a small garden that faces South, there are many more options for including a dynamic range of yard plants that take full advantage of the increased exposure of the sun.

Good plant choices for South-facing small garden design would fit in well with: a micro climate landscape theme that can be tropical, Mediterranean or dessert in nature.

For East-facing small garden design, you will want to stick to shade plants and plants that enjoy the morning sun as opposed to the scorching afternoon sun.

Good plant choices for East-facing small garden design would be Bromelias, schefflera, and Philodendron plants.

For West-facing small garden design, you want to stick to plants that enjoy the scorching afternoon sun. Any plant that loves the sun and needs less water will be a good choice here.

Good plant choices for West-facing small gardens would be: Lavanders, Echium, or Phormium plants. Also any types of grasses, and Mellaluca will thrive in this setting.

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What is the second question you should ask when designing a conceptual plan around your small garden ideas?

Another major consideration in the design of small gardens has to do with the function of the space. Is it for entertaining? Will you need room for guests, a barbecue pit, or an ample seating area? Will access be needed to the area? If you will be entertaining how many people do you want to be able to accommodate in the space? Will they be smoking? Are there views that you want to preserve, take advantage of or accentuate?

All of these function related questions should be asked and evaluated when putting together your conceptual landscape design plan.

Where can you get more help with small garden ideas?

 

More Backyard Designs

More Backyard Designs
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If the thought of dreaming up and then implementing new backyard desigbs fills you with dread never fear, we have a few suggestions to help you get started. If your backyard landscape is dreary or plain and you don’t want to spend a lot of time or money, read on this post is for you.

The backyard can be one of the most prized aspects of home ownership. It’s a place where you entertain friends with a delicious barbeque, swing in the hammock on a warm summer day or simply doze off while reading a good book. Unfortunately, when your backyard landscape is more ugly mess than sanctuary, it’s hard to truly enjoy this prized bit of real estate.

The good news is that it’s not hard to come up with good backyard designs and implementing them can be a snap.

Good backyard designs begin with a plan for how you would like to use the space. You can invest in software to help you with this process. There are several good programs available through Amazon.com. Or you can simply sketch out your ideas yourself on a scrap of paper.

As you begin to sketch out your backyard designs, here are some things to keep in mind:

Don’t get overwhelmed. If you have a big yard, consider breaking it up into sections and working on a section each year until the project is finished. This is a particularly good strategy if you are doing all of the work yourself and have a limited season to work on your backyard landscape.

Remember what your overall objectives are for your backyard retreat. Do you like to entertain and have cookouts? Then you may need to have more open space in your yard and a backyard landscape design that focuses on plants and shrubs around the borders of your yard may make the most sense.

If you don’t need the open space, consider an island flower bed, walkway ideas with solar lights, or comfortable furniture that you can rest in.

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If you enjoy wildlife and think having wild butterflies float across your yard would be desirable, take a look at the National Wildlife Federation’s website for plants that attract different wildlife. You can create a nice flower bed that is filled with plants that will have butterflies filling your yard in no time.

Keep it simple. One simple strategy for beautifying your backyard landscape is to simply surround your patio with shrubs and or flowering plants.

It is always nice to have plants that are native to your area in mind as you sketch out your backyard ideas. A quick Google search or trip to your local nursery can provide you with a wide variety of options.

How to find more backyard designs.

A simple Google search for “Backyard Designs” can reveal dozens of pictures and ideas that you can incorporate into your plan. You can also search home and garden magazines, or tour other nearby houses for additional backyard ideas.

It doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive to create and bring your backyard ideas to life, all you need is a manageable plan and some fresh ideas

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