Hildewintera AUREISPINA

Hildewintera AUREISPINA - Golden rat tail cactus, Hildewintera aureispina, Winter's cleistocactus, Cleistocactus winteri.

A very rare plant!

Hildewintera is a small group of cacti from South America, which various authors either distinguish as an independent genus or subsume within Cleistocactus. The plants originate from Bolivia, where they are found on rocks and cliffs, hanging down from rock faces.

The stems are slender, cylindrical, creeping or pendent, with numerous low ribs. The areoles are closely spaced, with thin, bristle-like, golden-yellow spines completely covering the shoot.

The flowers are large for such a stem, widely open, slightly asymmetrical. The fruit is a small juicy berry.

The golden rat tail cactus is a very beautiful cactus with long, slender pendent stems completely covered in golden-yellow spines. The shoots reach a meter (3.3 ft) or more, so the plant is grown as a hanging specimen.

In the widely opening corolla, the outer petals are pink, while the inner ones are orange-red; in addition, there are very small white petals closely pressed against the staminal filaments. Flowering is abundant, in spring and early summer.

Hildewintera seeds are small and dark. Soaking such tiny seeds is impractical, so the substrate itself is sterilized: before sowing, it is doused with a weak potassium permanganate solution and dried slightly. Scarification and stratification are not required.

Sowing is conducted on the surface, without burying, onto a sterile mineral substrate with a top layer of washed sand. The sowing is moistened from a spray bottle with a solution of growth stimulant: SUPERthrive, HB-101, Aminosol, Epin, or Zircon, covered with a transparent lid or placed in a greenhouse, and germinated under bright diffused light at a temperature of 22–28 °C (72–82 °F).

Seedlings emerge in 1–3 weeks, unevenly. Sowings are aired daily and condensation is wiped away: cactus seedlings are especially sensitive to stagnant moisture. Pricking out is carried out after the seedlings have visibly strengthened. The plant is also easily propagated by cuttings: a shoot segment is dried for 2–3 days and rooted in moist sand.

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The plant needs bright, but filtered light. Direct midday rays can cause scorching, so it is lightly shaded in summer.

The dormancy period falls between October and March. In winter, the plant tolerates coolness well, ideally 12–15 °C (54–59 °F), briefly enduring drops down to 5 °C (41 °F). With warm overwintering, the location must be very bright.

In summer, watering is regular, but before the next watering, the substrate must dry out completely. During cool overwintering, the plant is kept completely without water; during warm overwintering, it is watered sparingly, once every 3–4 weeks.

A loose, mineral, water-permeable substrate with a large proportion of coarse sand and perlite is needed. Drainage is necessarily placed at the bottom of the pot, and a wide and shallow container is chosen to accommodate the shallow root system.

Fertilization with cactus fertilizer is applied once a month from spring to late summer; no feeding is carried out in winter.

The shoots are fragile and break off easily, so the plant should be placed where it will not be brushed against. Broken trailing stems root easily and serve as cuttings.