Tuesday, February 15, 2011

A ruby - I think the end of my Christmas Cactus

Three years ago, the Christmas Cactus on my office desk flowered beautifully, and I happily posted the results. Wow, I can't believe I've been blogging here for so long!


Anyway, last year it flowered again, a little less intensely, but beautifully. The color is really special, and if makes the whole office happy for a few weeks each Winter. But last year, I noticed that making those huge blooms was apparently very stressful on my plant, and it never really recovered. A lot of the plant ended up dying altogether.


And so now I have a little left of my plant. Imagine my surprise to see that it made one last flower! I'm not sure that there will be anything left by next year, so I wanted to show you now, just in case. It starts out by making this interesting bud, and then starts peeling itself back:










There you have it - maybe the last flower! If anyone out there has any advice about how to save this poor thing, feel free to leave some advice in the comments!


And in the meantime, I'm enjoying the flower that I do have, and I hope you do too! 


For more reddish photography, go check out Ruby Tuesday, hosted by Mary at Work of the Poet. Have a great Tuesday, everyone! And a great week!

3 comments:

Marie said...

They are gorgeous these cactuses.

Unknown said...

stunning! i love the color.

forgetmenot said...

Beautiful little flower. I love how "prickly, thorny cacti can produce such lovely flowers. Mickie