San Francisco member

Thank you Hugo for your welcome message. I am a long time cactus hobbiest dating back to the mid 1950s but I really didn't get started collecting many plants until the 1970s after which I amassed a large collection, mostly of my very favorites, Mammillarias. The years from about 2000-2010 I sadly neglected my collection and lost many plants while others languished with no repotting or care other than water.

What have I let happen to my beautiful collection of plants that I truly love? It is tiime to regroup and put some good effort into my plants and that's where I am now, madly repotting into new soil mix that I make up myself, weeding out dead plants and weeds. I see many of your beautiful collections and hope someday that mine will rival them.

I am about 20 miles north of San Francisco where the weather is very different than in "the city". We have little fog and bright warm summer weather with rarely more than a few days over 100 deg F. Winter temperatures give us some light or medium frosts although I have seen 18 deg. F here.

I have an 8 x 12 foot greenhouse, unheated other than an electric heater for those very cold nights should they occur and am erecting another greenhouse, an 8 x 10 foot which should give me some room to grow.

After growing many different genera such as Mamms, Notocactus, Gymnos, some Ferocactus and Echinocereus and a few others I will now concentrate on Mammillarias and wish to build up my collection with some interesting new Mammillarias. I am happy to have found this forum and only wish I could jet around to see all of your collections.

Best,
Steve Stephens
San Anselmo, CA USA

Hi Steve, and welcome.

I think many of us here went through a number of other genera before we came to Mammillaria in a more significant way. Good luck with the regeneration project, I know how difficult this can be, but also very rewarding.

Welcome, Steve.

Chris and jfabiao, I also thank you for your welcome. I see wonderful collections here and I love your photos and blog jfabiao although I would have to dig deep to remember my spanish from high school.

My repotting has continued and even though it is late in the year perhaps to be repotting I have, in the past, seemed to have good luck repotting in or near the winter.

I will forcefully hose off the old soil, allow the roots to dry for several days, then put in fresh solid just slightly damp and not water for some time. I do hope this will work for me as I would hate to lose more plants than my 10 years of neglect has caused me to lose. I think I am on my way to successfully resurrecting my collection and it's almost time to start looking for some of the Mamms that I have lost or never had.

Best,
Steve Stephens
San Anselmo, CA