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[newmoon]

Hello,

I'm an enthusiastic hobbyist gardener living in the north part of the midwestern USA. I enjoy growing native prairie plants, and also am growing various magical plants from around the world - caapi, chacruna, anadenantheras, acacias, cacti, and others. Many of these plants struggle in my climate, which is extremely cold for much of the year, but the plants are going at their own, slow pace.

I'm a scientist professionally, although not a biologist. I'm also fairly knowledgeable about working with fungi.

Anyway, I'm glad to be here!

PS  is the mimosa verification question out of date?

[Shamichael]

Hello and welcome New Moon!  Speaking of prairie plants do you grow desmanthus Leptolobus?  I have a couple plants but didn't get seeds this year so I'm looking to get some more seeds and start them early this winter.
What is your strategy for over wintering your cacti and warm weather plants? I am finishing up a small greenhouse that will be heated above freezing this winter for my cacti and the rest of my plants will be inside with an assortment of lights and near windows.

[newmoon]

Hi,

Thanks for the welcome! I haven't grown D. leptolobus; I'm somewhat farther north than its native range, although I imagine with the changing climate it will do OK here soon (if not already). I've grown D. illinoensis, which I think is a very charming plant with cool seed pods.

How are you starting your prairie plants? I'm mostly doing trays outside in December to avoid needing artificial cold stratification.

This year I'm going to try putting the tender leafy plants in front of the sunnier windows indoors. In past years I've used lights, and I'll go back to that if they seem to need it. I'll put the trichocereus spp in the basement with overhead lights; should be cold enough for them to stop for the winter. Lophophoras seem to do fine in living spaces under some lights year round for me. I'm in zone 4 and it's below freezing for parts of 8 months most years, so my general approach is try to have stuff survive the winter and accept that growth takes a long time...gotta say I'm envious of people in less extreme climates!

[Shamichael]

Woah zone 4 brrrrr!
I am zone 6b historically, but really now I am 6a and some years and in years to come I will just be a zone 7.

Two years ago I started some D. leptolobus and D Illinoensis in the winter under some cheap T8 type LEDs and planted them outside.  Many of them got killed this spring when my wife planted dahlias in the area but some came up in between but no flowers or seeds and I'm not sure which plants are which.
I just use the cheapest led 4' shop lights to start my seeds and have had good success.
Last yr I put all my cacti in the house but with no light, and no water so they just were dormant then I had to reintroduce them to the sun very slowly over 2 weeks.

[Yves0071]

Hi Newmoon!
Welcome here!
In deed it is quite difficut to register as links for some question are broken. For the Mimosa question, use one  or other synonyms
Best regards
Yves

[newmoon]

Yves, thank you!

Shamichael, yeah, it's pretty chilly  . I think I'm in 4b now officially, but we've had temperatures below that in recent years still.

Very cool! The D. illinoensis seed pods are super distinctive, so it'll be easy to tell them apart whenever they decide to go there.