Cactus Altruicus
My first thought when I discovered this cactus was something like “There needs to be a lot more of this in the world.” To me, that is problem #1 to solve. I immediately determined to propagate and distribute plants in some way or other.
Within a couple of weeks of deciding I was on that mission of propagation, I was driving on a little traveled road to not much of anywhere. This road is not just going nowhere much, but also comes from nowhere much. About 10 miles from one small town and 30 from the other. I spotted a glimpse of green stuff dumped on the side of the road as I zipped by. My thoughts were something like…
“Is that a bunch of cactus?”
“what if it’s San Pedro?.”.
“nah, no way.”
I turned around to check it out, and there was a big pile of San Pedro stalks! WTF was that! I don’t think I even know of any live plants visibly growing in the small town 10 miles away, and here I am up a very rough, winding road and there is a pile of the stuff. Having just decided I wanted to grow and propagate more of it, the timing was appropriate and uncanny. A couple years later, I found out that some friends in the neighborhood had cut it down to redo siding on their house.
There is a human culture that evolves and changes around San Pedro cactus. Like other plant/human interactions, without the plant, it would not exist at all. Human cultural interaction has shaped the cactus in form and the cactus has shaped humans and human culture. That process continues on as culture continually changes. Let me present you with two essentially opposing ethos.
I like cactus, I want more cactus, gimme cactus, I can use this cactus to get more cactus, this cactus is worth a lot of money. Bro I would totally give you some cactus, but I have to leverage this cactus to get more cactus for myself. Cactus is great for my self improvement.
or
As the cactus and cactus culture does for me, so I do for the cactus and cactus culture. What can I do to spread cactus and cactus culture in a way that fosters an ethos of generosity and fellowship, so that cactus is accessible and abundant.
Every act and every interaction can have ripple effects in this subculture, and every act will constantly evolve, devolve, reinforce or recreate the character and experience of that culture. This is not hyberbole or empty rhetoric, it is just true. Our actions and attitudes persist and influence not just the immediate, but the continued, experience of others. In our case, that “karma” for lack of a better term, can follow a cactus we are growing. If you’ve ever given a cactus away, when that person looks at that cactus, they’ll be like, “I remember when so and so gave me that cactus. I’m so glad thy did, this thing is awesome!”
I think that the cactus should be the center of this picture, and not how much cactus or money I can get for myself, or any kind of self serving cactus fetishism. And, that is how I approach this website and business. Cactus first, people and a positive cactus culture second, my self service and other people’s self service last.
I’m not saying self service is bad, or people should not be compensated for their time, or that we shouldn’t prize our cactus and fetishize over it to a degree. After all, If we were not benefited in some way, and motitvated by this association, we would have no interest in it. What I’m saying is that our general attitude and approach to these things shape the culture and everyone’s experience. An ethos that seeks balance and errs toward an emphasis on gratitude, where we see the cactus as a treasured gift to be shared and increased for the general good, is one that resonates with and increases our humanity and positive virtues. Attitude of gratitude dude.
So, having discovered Wachuma, I quickly started thinking about how to solve what I perceived as problem #1, getting more cactus into the world. I started propagating what I had and giving them away. I also quickly recognized that the fastest way to propagate and get more plants out into the world, and preferably in the ground, was by growing seedlings, not cuttings. Growing from cuttings is slow, especially if we are seeking diverse genetics.
I got a few seeds from a friend and grew some of them successfully. The next year I got a lot more seed resulting from some interesting intentional cross-pollinations, and grew out about 2500 seedlings. I kept a few to grow out and assess further, gave a lot of them away, and sold the rest. I sold them very cheap, in the hope that people would buy a lot and plant them in the ground somewhere. That plan seemed to work. People would come up to the homestead and leave with dozens of babies. If I had charged twice as much, I would probably not have sold them all and then there would be fewer plants out there. Thus was the plan hatched to produce lots of cheap seedlings.
I have based my approach to this project on the assumption that cheaper plants will translate to more cactus planted and distributed, thus serving my prime directive. I sold my first ones pretty cheap, but my goal is to bring down the price of quality seedlings enough so that I can move a lot more, putting quantity distributed over individual unit cost. One way I can bring cost down is by bringing time, energy and money costs down. It’s all about increasing production efficiency. Less handling and maintenance means less time invested. Like any business or production endeavor, ideally we identify problems and bottlenecks and then pursue practical, creative solutions. Being a polymathic INTJ, who arrogantly thinks he can improve everything, I’m perfectly positioned to do just that. Just ask me :D! Investing time and energy into testing and money into infrastructure up front, in order to streamline production can yield huge dividends in the production of anything. Early efforts are going okay and I have more ideas to try and refinements to make.
I can also often ship the plants cheaply and quickly if I sell most of them at about 1/2” to 1” inch high. The shipping method I use is simple, fast and cheap. I pop the babies out of the flat, knock loose soil off the roots, drop up to a dozen in a small zippered baggie with some dry vermiculite and put them in a small, lightweight box with some crumpled newspaper. Aside from cold weather freezing risks, it seems to work great. First class mail is cheap and I can ship a lot of baby cactus up to the first class weight limit using this method. There is no fussing with wrapping individual seedlings or bagging them separately. The vermiculite absorbs any free moisture droplets that might otherwise condense in the bag, and also sticks to the spines, so that they stab each other less in transit. I have left 1/2 to 3/4 inch seedlings in these baggies on the counter for a couple of months and then replanted them with just a little delay in re-establishment. So, a week in the mail is no biggie. Minimizing fuss and extra work in shipping really saves a lot of time, so again, I can charge less per plant.
I’m not martyring myself at the altar of The Church San Pedro Proliferation. I desperately need money to support my life as a private researcher and educator in other arenas (some of which you can see here). Hopefully this project will turn a decent profit once it’s up and running. But my first allegiance is with the cactus and it’s proliferation. The only real argument against bringing the price of seedlings down is hurting other grower’s profits. But here is the thing, this is a transparent project. It is just as much or probably more, a labor of love and altruistic offering to cactus culture as it is a source of income. In that spirit, I will be sharing any and all innovations and knowledge in cactus culture for use by anyone. If anyone wants to compete I will literally tell you how, so you can also produce jillions of seedlings and put me out of business. If the market saturates, that’s great, mission accomplished, tons more affordable cactus in the world is my prime directive and then I can go do something else.
Each genetic collection out there is a heap of potential waiting to be tapped to serve something bigger than ourselves. While asking what the cactus and culture can do for us, which is so much, lets also keep asking what we can do for the cactus and to expand, maintain and improve the culture. There is an inherent value to ourselves, and to everyone else, in expanding this plant and the human activity around it in a spirit of generosity and love by each act we commit. #randomactsofwachuma #teamwachuma