Prickly Pear Pad Propogation

[melop]

Wow, try saying that a few times.lol.

A few days ago I had taken a few pads from my father's prickly pear cacti in order to propagate. I took mostly immature pads as they were the easiest to rip off; I also cut one mature pad. Later he had mentioned that immature pads won't put out roots.
I've tried verifying this by researching on the web but haven't had any luck.

I was wondering if anyone knew anything about whether this is true or not?

Any help is greatly appreciated!

[rainbowgardener]

I don't really know, but since no one else responded, I will give it a shot.

What I do know about prickly pear is that it incredibly easy to propagate. Often if you just throw a pad on the ground, it will root itself in and start growing. I would expect if it is even close to maturity, that will still work.

So give it a try with what you have and see what happens! I'd be really surprised if you didn't get at least some prickly pear starts.

Keep us posted how it works!

[imafan26]

Do the immature pads have nodes on them? If there are nodes they should be able to root. Make sure you dry the cut ends about a week in the shade before you plant them so they don't rot.

[lakesRus84]

Sorry, wish I'd been on here sooner - I've just propagated a bunch of these recently.. Some successful, some, not so much... I have some with fat pads, thin pads, big pads, little pads, several different varieties, but as far as I can tell, they all really seem to propagate the same.... In bone dry sandy succulent soil. Don't water until they've sprouted roots. I learned that the hard way.... buncha times actually... when I first began my adventures with succulents, it took forever for it get thru my thick head that succulents don't. LOVE. WATER... and they especially don't love it when they don't have roots to take it up with !!! Lol! So anyways... yeah... leave em dry, dry, dry, and check em after about 2 weeks... if no roots yet, but the cutting's not rotted, just stick it back and wait some more... one thing you can do, is spritz em just a bit, after about 2 weeks, cuz that seems to be the "teaser" that gets the roots coming when it appears be taking longer than others..... And last but not least, to answer your question: No... I haven't had any luck yet with "baby pads".... not saying it can't happen, just saying I've failed at 100% of my attempts with baby growth thus far.... Which stinks I know... especially since the majority of your cuttings are young growth... good news, all my prickly pear type stuff grows super fast! So hopefully that one big pad you've got will take, so you can have a big ol' plant to work with in no time! Take care, Erika

[melop]

Hi yeah the new pads (immature) didn't take at all. They just flat out rotted even without giving them any moisture. I guess my dad was right.haha.
So far I have a few mature pads that seem to be making it, I let them dry out for a long long time in sandy/clayish soil..several weeks, and just recently started giving them water since I noticed they were looking 'flat'. They plumped back up but didn't turn to mush. I think they'll make it. Yay.

Thanks for the responses!