PlantFiles: Ric Rac Orchid Cactus, Fishbone Cactus, St. Anthony's Rick-Rack
Selenicereus anthonyanus

I picked this plant up 10 years ago from an estate sale. The woman who had this plant had it for a long while because it was HUGE. Got her Christmas Cactus as well. I put them both on my porch (south east exposure) in central Georgia and it did very well and the rick rack in fact BLOOMED! I did my best to completely ignore it. Read that, job had me traveling a lot so I was home only once a month and when I remembered I'd water it. Every December I would bring it in and put it in a south east window. And then....drum roll here....one year a hard freeze snuck up on me and most of this 4 foot wide plant DIED. :( . I brought it in, cut off the yucky bits and low and behold, it came back. Then last year my new German Shepherd puppy knocked it over and dragged the pot from the porch to the yard. Now I had several segments left. I used this as a propagation opportunity and put the bits into three pots. No new blooms yet, we are still working on getting more ric rac growth. But, let me tell you, you can't kill this thing! I love it. Be careful about over fertilizing, it spurts the growth and doesn't allow the ric rac to develop well.

I was thrilled to see this post. Pictures are out of this world. But no one said anything as to best soil or how to best plant it and especially how to get it to bloom. What fertilizer does it like.

I have a Ric Rac Cactus and the blooms are a lovely pale to golden yellow. The plant itself is nearly 4 feet across and is thriving.

I got this plant in 1994. My daughter was taking a class in HS (Plant Lab and brought it home. Has bloomed profusely maybe twice. In general, I get 2 or 3 blooms and that's that.
I grow it indoors, next to a sunny window (East). I'll try to fertilize at the end of winter ad see if it blooms again. Wen it is in flu bloom it's gorgeous, I live in No. Virginia.

Well, it's been growing very well for about five years now and refuses to bloom. Indoors in sun room in winter at 62ºF. Outdoors in summer (Zone 6-7 coastal NJ) with intermittent sun/shade. Always damp -- and deluged when it rains. Long, branching leaves with a few nasty spines. I have a collection of flowering epiphytes but this one refuses to bloom along with the rest of them!
Can blooms be coaxed?

I kept this in my house for many years in a brightly-lit room. Recently, I placed it outside for a few days but it was deluged with heavy rain and low temps above freezing. Now all branches have turned brown and soft. Can I prune off the brown branches and save the plant? How can I propogate it with the few green shoots left?
Thanks!

I purchased this plant from a grocery store many years ago because of the interesting zig zag stems. I had no idea what it was until someone here on Dave's Garden identified it for me and told me it was a night bloomer. I'm not fond of thorny plants but the fragrant blooms on this one make up for the sharp spines! I grow it in @ 90% orchid bark and 10% potting soil which makes for a chunky, fast draining mix.

I have had this plant for more or less 18 years in extremely hot sub-tropical conditions. It flowers and multiplies like crazy. Very pest and disease resistant. Rough on the hands though - treat with care. A Fish-bone in full bloom is a beautiful sight to behold. I stay on the East Coast of South Africa, near the Mocambiquan border. Day temps around 36 with killer humidity factors.

This plant practically grows it self. I obtained it by accident. A tenant moved out and left it behind. I just learned today what it is called thanks to Dave Garden Forums.
Now I have learned the blooms are gorgeous and cannot wait to give it what it needs so it will produce for me. I love this plant but, I am having a little bit of difficultly figuring out what the bright orange coloring on its leaves means. It starts out as a beautiful bright orange and then turns the plant brown and mushy. I thought it might be a kind of fungus because I live on the water and I noticed a orange slim on their sea wall. It is not on my sea wall! The orange is not something that can be rubbed off. I have cut away the bad parts in hopes to get a handle on the problem. Any ideas what I need to do?

As a child growing up in India ,we had this huge plant of the ric rac cactus that climbed its way all over the side walls, over the roof and had reached over 45 feet tall! it started off as a cutting burrowed into a small patch of soil by the drain pipe!! After several years, it developed spines all over and was difficutl to handle. However, it never did bloom , not sure why!

I got a small cutting of this plant a few months ago and it grew to about 3ft so i cut it then repotted it and not have all new shoots comming off of it.

Around 10 to 15 yrs. ago I obtained a ric rac cactus plant my stepmother rooted for me from cuttings from her plant. I had it for many years and I shared cuttings with several friends and was glad I did because one winter my plant got left outside during an unexpected frost and got totally killed back. Today I got cuttings back from one of the friends I gave some to so I'm anxious to get it rooted and growing once again. As long as I had my original plant it never did bloom and I didn't know that they ever did. From the picture of the bloom at your site it looks to me exactly like the bloom on my Night Blooming Cereus plant which when it blooms has a beautiful white flower and only lasts through one night.

This is a truly wonderous plant! It grows up into our ornamental cherry tree. It intertwines through the branches. Where ever the thing hangs down (which is in a lot of places), the ends have formed buds. While the plant is smooth, the "ball" just behind the buds has little hair-like needles (they hurt!). The buds are big (4") and the flowers are huge (6"+) and the smell great. You can break off a piece, stick it in the ground, and it grows. Or, you can beak off a piece, put it in water for a week and it grows roots (and then you can give it away). Everyone who has seen it wants it. Unfortunately, squirrels think the flowers are candy and they eat the flowers as soon as they open (which, happens at dusk). It's a race to see who gets to them 1st- us or the squirrels! We live in Titusville, FL (our microclimate is ~ Hardiness Zone 10) and the plant grows just great in the ground.

I've had this plant in a hanging basket in my lathhouse for about 3 years. Very low maintenance here [27.0 n, 82.4 w].

This interesting epiphytic cactus doesn´t even look like a real plant. Really, looks like something made that thing up and sold it everywhere.

Being epiphytic, it lives on trees, under light shade. The stems are flat, like an Epiphyllum, but with alternate projections on each side. The stems can grow up to 50 cm or more, always curved downwards. I never saw flowers of it, but I found pictures on Google showing gorgeous flowers with white, pink and red petals, ressembling me of an Epiphyllum. The ovarium below seems to be quite spiny. The rest of the plant doesn´t have spines at all.

It needs a solid, organic support, like bark bits or fiber, to stabilish itself. It likes constant watering, don´t let the medium dry. Plus, high temperatures and light shade will be great.