HELP: Cactus Growing large and skinny

[mstout]

Hi! I have had a cactus for 10 years that I received in a pot with other succulents. The rest of the plant died quickly and were taken out leaving a lone cactus. Since then I took out their roots, removed the fake rocks glued on top, changed the soil, and tied it to steaks to hold it up. It is watered every 3 weeks and gets lots of sun. The cactus is about three feet high with lots of limbs and is very skinny. The cactus averages about a 6 to 7 inch diameter with a very skinny part in the middle. The cactus seems healthy, but is developing a slight curve. Is there a way to thicken it or such?

[Happy Days]

Hi. Can you describe the growing conditions? Plants often grow tall and thinner as they stretch toward more sunlight. You could certainly stake it, but cacti don't generally require staking.

[rainbowgardener]

A picture and to know where you are and what kind of cactus it is would help. If you don't know what kind, then just a couple pictures and probably someone here will be able to ID it.

[mstout]

Here are some pictures
Sorry for the decorations

[mstout]

It gets direct sunlight

[baileysup]

I'm not sure about thickening it up, as it looks rather healthy. You may be able to get it to grow in a different direction by turning the pot, and giving it sun from a different angle. Also, since the cactus is pretty tall, you may want to consider a deeper pot. A deeper pot would allow a larger root system to help anchor the cactus, and keep it from falling over. Just my opinion here. It's a nice cactus, so good luck with it.

[imafan26]

I had one of those. I don't know what they were called but when they got too big. I lopped off a branch and made a new one.

[rainbowgardener]

Thanks for the pics. I do like imafan's suggestion, if that is getting to be too much cactus to keep in the house, you can take a cutting and start over. You said elsewhere that your are in northern New Jersey, so clearly the cactus needs to stay in for the winter. In the spring when you take it out would be a good time to start the cutting, then you can just fail to bring the big one back in, this fall.

Nothing else you can do is going to make what you have any shorter. For future reference, the more light and the less fertilizer you give it, the more compact it will be. It sounds backwards that more light keeps it shorter, but as already stated, plants stretch for the light. You said it gets direct sun, but it is sitting in front of a blank wall. Unless it was just moved there for the picture, it's not getting much direct sun. If you start that cutting, put it right in front of a good south facing window and/or put a lamp directly on it from a few inches away. That should help it stay more compact. And cacti should be in a cactus mix soil which is very sandy and mineral and need little to no fertilizing.

[imafan26]

I learned too that not only give it more light but keep the pot small and the roots tight and the cactus will stay small longer. You would be surprised how adaptable cacti are to small pots. That particular cactus in the picture though likes to grow big even in a small pot but I have kept agave in a six inch pot until it bloomed. That means it was in that pot about 15 years.

I think that cactus is a type of cereus.

[mstout]

thank you all
I also did move the cactus a little over for the picture. It's normally in front of a big window.

[applestar]

I was trying to find a photo of a well grown specimen to compare branching nodes and central trunk internodes to see if this one is lacking light.

Cereus seem to tend to have flat side shoots and trail down? (I did see a photo of giant shrubby cereus with bristly multi-angled trunks). And tall growing cacti tend to have multi-pointed star-like cross section -- and lots of spines. This one looks as though it's trigonal? Can it be a type of euphorbia?

[Jank]

I have a cactus that is about 9 mo. Old and is growing several shots, all tall and skinny! Should I clip the tall shoots and will that help them fatten up?