Schlumbergera (genus, Christmas cactus, "Shakobasaboten")

Japanese name: シャコバサボテン
Scientific name: Schlumbergera

[Overview]
A group produced by crossing forest cacti that grow epiphytically on trees in forests.
It is a flowering cactus grown for its blooms.
The stems are well-branched, flat and leaf-like, and the margins of the stem segments are round-toothed to sharply toothed.
There are no spines.
The stem segments hang down as they grow long.
One or two flowers are borne at the tip of a stem segment.
The flowers are radially or bilaterally symmetrical, with many glossy, translucent tepals that are thin in texture and strongly recurved.
The inner tepals are fused at the base to form a tube.
The flowers vary in size and color; flower colors include red, white, yellow, pink and orange.
There are many stamens, some fused to the inner surface of the perianth tube and others forming a tube surrounding the base of the pistil.

[Cultivation]
Propagate by cuttings.
It prefers a sunny place, but direct summer sun causes leaf scorch, so move it to partial shade in summer.
Plant it in well-drained, well-aerated soil; from spring to autumn, water when the soil surface dries, reduce watering from the time buds form, and keep it on the dry side in winter.
Overwatering causes root rot.
In spring to early summer, give slow-release fertilizer or liquid fertilizer rich in phosphate.
It is a short-day plant that flowers as the days shorten, so it flowers poorly where it is bright at night, such as near a streetlight.
In winter, place it indoors, for example on a windowsill, so that it does not freeze.
Take care, because moving a plant that has set buds can cause the buds to drop from the sudden change in environment.
If the stem segments keep growing even when it is time for buds to form, no flowers will appear, so pinching off the reddish new shoots at the tips makes flower buds form more easily.
In summer, slugs, scale insects and cutworms may appear.

[Notes]
The Japanese name compares the shape of the leaf-like stems to a shako (mantis shrimp).
The plants sold in Japan under the name Shakoba-saboten are Schlumbergera ×buckleyi or its parents S. russeliana (the true Shakoba-saboten) and S. truncata (Kaniba-saboten).
Those that bloom in December–January are also called Christmas cactus, and those bred in Denmark are also called Denmark cactus.

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