Grow Christmas cactus this way and new shoots keep sprouting, with hundreds of flowers blooming every year
The Christmas cactus has green leaves and blooms very beautifully and charmingly, making it an ornamental flower best suited for growing in the living room, bedroom, or balcony. I have several pots of Christmas cactus at home. Although they bloomed every year before, their growth was too slow and the leaves were not fresh. Ever since a classmate told me a method for growing Christmas cactus, after I used it, it really proved to be a good method. After each blooming period, new shoots keep growing, and the leaves look very fresh and glossy. Sometimes I had no choice but to prune some of the overly dense stem segments, otherwise they would grow too densely. Today I am fortunate to share it with flower lovers who enjoy growing flowers.
This method is simple to describe. Anyone who grows flowers knows that the Christmas cactus has fine roots, and part of its nutrients are obtained from the air through the aerial roots on its stem segments. Based on this growth habit, except during the flowering period, a diluted fertilizer solution can be sprayed cyclically twice a month, which can make its stems and leaves grow rapidly, increase new shoots, and make the leaf color oily green and glossy. The method I use is: in the first half of the month, spray the stem segments once with 1 part beer mixed with 10 parts water; in the second half of the month, spray with a mixture of 0.1% urea and 0.1% monopotassium phosphate. However, spraying is not suitable in winter and during high-temperature summer weather, to prevent burning the leaves. The best time to spray is in the morning or evening, and the spraying concentration must not be too strong; it is better to use less than too much.
The main reason many people fail to grow Christmas cactus well is either a watering problem or poor soil quality. The roots of the Christmas cactus like to grow in loose, breathable sandy soil, and ordinary garden soil makes it very difficult to grow Christmas cactus well. My Christmas cactus uses 60% humus soil + 40% river sand. Nothing is laid at the bottom of the pot; I just use these two things mixed together, and after several years now, the growth is still very good. So growing Christmas cactus does not need to be made so complicated; the simpler, the easier it is to grow. Just be careful not to water too much normally, and do not let it be exposed to strong sunlight. It does not matter if the potting soil is a little dry, but do not let it dry out completely; keep it moist but not overly wet.
Many flower lovers say that the Christmas cactus they grow is unwilling to bloom. To encourage the Christmas cactus to bloom, short-day treatment should be carried out one month before flowering, so that its daily light exposure does not exceed 8 hours, including light exposure at night. Shading treatment can be used, such as a black convenience bag or other items to block light, keeping it in a dark environment from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m. the next morning, without interruption in between. Generally, flower buds can appear in about one month.