Dying Moon Cactus

[momo2083]

Hi,
About a month ago my daughter received a succulent garden for a present. One of the plants in it was a moon cactus. It appears that it now has root rot. Any advice on how to help it/if it can be helped? Appreciate any ideas.

[baileysup]

You will need to get rid of the rotten bits (anything mushy or brown...ect), and let it heal and dry before replanting in soil. If the rot consists of the entire base of the cactus, and not just some roots, the only thing you can do at that point is cut the cactus off above the rotten part. You will then need to let it callous for about a week, maybe longer before planting it back in soil. It will take some time, but it will form new roots. At this point you should water the cactus VERY LITTLE, if at all for quite some time. Roots develop best in dry soil. Good luck

[Gary350]

Warm weather promotes the growth of new roots. If you keep the plant inside the house in air conditioning it will be slower to grow roots than if you keep it outside where the summer temperature is warmer.

Your soil should be 50/50 sand/potting soil, very well drained soil. I don't have a problem watering my cactus every day, I don't flood it, I just give it a little sprinkle of water. An ice cube is a very good way to water a small cactus set it on the soil and let it melt.

I put a cactus segment in wet soil yesterday evening about 6 pm so it could root. This morning I decided to move the cactus segment to a different pot and was surprised it grew a 1" long root over night. Temperature here is in the 90s during the day and 70s at night the warm temperature speeds up the rooting process.