Container Gardening with Cacti and Succulents

Some fascinating gardens take place in containers, especially those with succulents and cacti, which create little worlds unto themselves.

Agave parryi
Item # 12753 		Agave parryi
Parry's Century Plant, Flagstaff form

each $7.99
3 to 6 $7.49
7 or more $7.29
Echinocereus coccineus 'Sandia Mts.'
Item # 46933 		Echinocereus coccineus 'Sandia Mts.'
Needle Spined Claret Cup

each $5.99
3 to 6 $5.79
7 or more $5.59

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Some fascinating gardens take place in containers, especially with the succulents and cacti. These easy but ‘special needs’ plants provide year round interest, indoors or out. Once you venture into this particular corner of horticulture, you’ll notice these tough plants create little worlds unto themselves that are hard to resist.

Features and Suitability

Cacti and succulents are revered for their:

  • bright, showy flowers
  • geometrically arranged spines
  • handsome architectural foliage

Also, their adaptability to heat, intense sunshine and ability to thrive with little maintenance under dry conditions make them an excellent choice for potted gardens.

Container culture is often the easiest way to grow cacti and succulents. This is especially true in climates where high amounts of rain/snow fall rot the roots of xeric species when planted in the ground or where the climate is too cold in the winter.

Key to Success

The key to successful containers of cacti and succulents is using the correct soil mix. Soil for growing these plants must provide excellent drainage without excessive organic matter content

Many species of cacti and succulents suffer when their soil mix is too fertile and contains large percentages of compost and peat moss. The basic formula for making a fast draining potting mix follows:

Mix 3 parts high quality soil-less potting soil, 1 part coarse sand and 1 part volcanic scoria, coarse Perlite or small diameter (less than 3/8”) crushed gravel or limestone. In very hot, dry situations where some additional moisture retention is helpful, garden loam can be mixed half and half with the soil-less potting soil.

Containers

I always recommend using ceramic pots. Whether the pot is terra cotta or glazed depends solely upon your own personal preference. Because a healthy cactus or succulent plant can live for many years, plastic containers will often deteriorate prematurely. This requires that plants be repotted, a difficult and dangerous task, especially when handling large specimens.

The choice of containers is dependent on the types of cacti and succulents you are going to plant.

  • Large specimens like big barrel Ferocactus, columnar Trichocereus cacti or succulent Agave (Century Plants) require large pots to accommodate their large root systems and counterbalance their imposing bulk. The pots must be substantial enough to support these large plants without tipping over.
  • Other succulents like the South African memsembranthemums are best planted into smaller pots. In this manner, their diminutive stature can best be appreciated from up-close as a tabletop display.
  • Bowl shaped pots are excellent for clumping species as these shallow rooted plants benefit from being given ample room to cluster their stems as they grow. Species of cacti that form large, multi-stemmed clusters such as Claret Cup (Echinocereus triglochidiatus) and large growing Nipple Cacti (Mamillaria) prefer being planted into bowls.

Re-potting is only needed when the plants have grown to the edges of the pot and the plants stop growing in size. Remember that cacti and succulents are healthier and happier when under potted (slightly undersized pot).

Plant Arrangements

Collectors such as myself, enjoy planting species from a single region into a pot to create an authentic landscape in miniature. For example, you could gather up a variety of cacti from the Big Bend region of southwestern Texas or a group of succulents from the Great Karoo region of south-central South Africa and then artfully combine them into a series of display containers. This can be both an educational and an aesthetically pleasing foundation for building a valuable collection of succulent species.

Care and Maintenance

While cacti and succulents are low-care plants, they will benefit from and look better with regular watering, fertilizing and the removal of shriveled foliage.

Watering

Thoroughly soak established containers every week to10 days in the heat of summer. Newly planted pots will require more frequent watering to establish their plants.

I always recommend a saucer be used under the pots to allow the water that flows through the pots to be re-absorbed for a thorough soaking of the soil.

Established plants like to dry out between waterings. A small cactus in a great big pot will often lose its roots as the soil doesn’t dry out quickly enough. This is most often a problem in the late fall/winter/early spring when the plants are dormant.

Fertilizing

A monthly dose of liquid seaweed (Sea-Com PRG) and a low nitrogen fertilizer like Earth Juice ‘Grow’ at recommended rates is a good schedule.

In Cold Climates

In very cold climates where outdoor pots would freeze solidly, even very cold-hardy types will benefit from some winter protection. Cacti and succulents can be successfully over-wintered in minimally heated greenhouses and sunrooms. Winter chilling will also result in improved flowering the next growing season. In milder winter climates pots can be left outside for the winter.

It is vitally important that watering be greatly decreased in the fall. Cacti and succulents need to dry down and begin to shrivel in preparation for winter. This is especially true when wintering plants in cold climates. Working with these particular plants is not difficult, but once you get the finer points down they can provide lots of enjoyment.