The queen of the night flower is one of the prettiest flowers you would want to have in your garden. It’s so interesting that it can grow up to 10 feet tall. It has different colors of flowers and looks beautiful in Pink, White, Yellow, and Cream color. The astonishing queen of the night flower scientifically known as “Epiphyllum oxypetalum” can be considered an indoor as well as outdoor plant. You may want to stay up at night to enjoy watching this pretty flower opening up. Another interesting fact about the night cactus is that it can grow on other plants or flowers. It is also referred to as the Dutchman’s pipe cactus or night cactus.
- Queen of the Night Flower Care
- Potting and Repotting
- Types of Queen of the Night Flower
- Queen of the Night Flower Propagation
- Grow Queen of the Night Flower from Seed
- How to Get Queen of the Night Flower to Bloom?
- Queen of the Night Flower Common Issues
- Queen of the Night Flower Colors
- Queen of the Night Flower Conclusion
- Queen of the Night Flower FAQs
- Other Houseplant Varieties
Queen of the Night Flower Care
A healthy queen of the night flower plant needs a lot of care. Let’s see how you can care for a healthy night queen flower plant. There are many important factors you must know before you start taking care of this marvelous night cactus beauty.
Light Requirements
Though it’s a night flower still like all other plants, it needs bright light to grow. Though direct sunlight is very crucial for it to blossom but only in the mornings and it should be kept in indirect light afterward. It needs the same amount of light even in winter. The morning sun provides the best light and if it gets no light then it might not bloom. Few important things to know about the light requirements of the queen of the night flower plant:
- It needs about six hours of bright and indirect sunlight. Too much direct sunlight is not needed for this night queen plant.
- South facing wall is best for indoor orchid cactus. (Note: It should be protected from the afternoon sun).
- If you choose to plant it in the ground, keep it in a dappled shade.
Soil Type
Night cactus grows well if you provide the right soil type for them. Let’s explore how to prepare the perfect soil type to grow night queen. You would need:
- Well-drained or airy soil.
- It should be able to hold moisture. Dry soil is not suitable for night cactus flowers.
- It must be a little acidic.
- Apart from the above-mentioned requirements, you would need peat moss, orchid bark, and perlite to mix and make an ideal soil type for the night queen.
Water Schedule
As you now know that the night cactus plant needs moist soil to grow so you must take care of the water schedule or requirement of the queen of the night plant. Let’s check out what level of water requirement night queen has:
- Water is needed for moist soil as dry soil will make the roots rot and the night queen flower will die.
- It requires humid weather to grow.
- If you plant night cactus in some other location, you have to water it every week during the summers.
- Even in winter, you can water it every 2-3 weeks depending on your location.
- Young queen of the night flower plants needs more water whereas the mature plants won’t need as much.
Optimal Temperature
The right soil and water requirement results in a healthy blooming queen of the night flower plant. Apart from these, you must provide an optimal temperature for this plant. In case you opt to grow this beautiful night cactus in your home garden, you must protect it from direct sunlight during the summer months.
- The optimal temperature for the queen of the night flower plant is between 50° F and 90° F or 10° C to 32° C.
- The minimum temperature required for night queen is 40° F or 4.5° C.
- You shall expose your night queen plant to cooler temperatures in winter but not less than 35° F or 1.7° C as it might hamper its growth.
- If you have kept it indoors, make sure the temperature is between 65° F to 75° F (18°C – 24°F).
- You shall move the night queen to a cooler place in winter where it’s 60°F to 65°F (16°C – 18°C) in the daytime and 45°F to 55°F (7°C – 13°C) during nighttime.
- The above requirement becomes more important for eight weeks as that’s the time when the flower buds grow.
- If you’ve grown it in the ground, then it needs USDA 10 to 12 to thrive.
So, if you have this beautiful queen of the night flower in your garden, it’s vital to protect it from the intense afternoon sun during the summer months.
Humidity Levels
Your favorite queen of the night flower grows best in normal humidity levels at your house temperature. If the humidity inside your house ranges between 40 and 50 percent, you can choose to grow queen of the night at your home. You can also increase humidity for it by placing this on a pebble and keeping it in a water tray. This is most helpful if they are dry at your place. Usually, humidity is not an issue you would face while growing night cactus in your home.
Fertilizer
If you want to know a secret to growing a healthy queen of the night flower plant, you must “fertilize” it throughout the year. Though the fertilizers shall be used in moderation.
During spring and fall, dilute the fertilizer and keep the NPK ratio of 10-10-10. You may pick low nitrogen of NPK ratio 2-10-20 to boost the blooming process.
Tip – You can pause fertilization during the summer season and make sure to keep the soil moist but not soggy.
Potting and Repotting
You must learn about the most important part of growing queen of the night i.e., potting of the night cactus. Potting plays an important part in the growth of the night cactus.
- Pick a well-drained pot. It would help prevent water logging in the pot.
- A clay pot is advisable as it is moisture free and allows breathing.
- Avoid plastic pots.
- You can use a mid-size or small pot as the night queen plant is an epiphyte. You can use a six-inch pot at the max.
If you feel like repotting the plant, you can easily do so. First, you should know that this plant blooms better when it’s rootbound. If you do so, you need not repot it often. You must repot it only if has poor drainage.
Note: Do not repot if not necessary as it can stress the roots or can cause poor blooming in summer.
If you still need to repot this cactus plant, water it a day before. This will not shock the roots of the plant. Then choose one or two sizes larger plants than the current one. Use fresh potting mix and add more perlite and orchid bark. This will create a suitable potting medium.
Types of Queen of the Night Flower
There are many types of the queen of the night flower plant. This night cactus is a part of the night-blooming Cereus cactus family. They need the same kind of care to grow and most of them bloom at night.
Kinds of the Queen of the Night Flower
There are five main kinds of night cactus plants and most of them are fragrant.
- Red Orchid Cactus – It has deep red blooms and is grown in a hanging basket.
- Vanilla Catus – It has lily pink flowers. It blooms at night.
- Peruvian Apple Cactus – It has a pinkish-red flower that turns into an edible fruit. This cactus is tall.
- Hooker’s Orchid – The petals of this spindling cactus are razor-thin.
- Dragon Fruit Cactus – This one has big white blooms with yellow in the center. It grows edible fruits that are neon pink in color.
Queen of the Night Flower Propagation
It’s easy to propagate the queen of the night flower. All you need to do is to follow the given steps:
- Pick a healthy portion of the plant and cut around four to six inches of it.
- Take a rooting hormone and dip this cutting in it.
- Keep it in a cool dark place for the next two days.
- This will allow it to callus.
- Now you can plant this cutting in the soil.
- Do not water the plant for the next ten to twelve days now.
Grow Queen of the Night Flower from Seed
You can also choose to grow a queen of the night plant using seeds. Unlike growing the plant from a cutting, this method of growing it using seed has different steps and needs patience.
- Pick the seeds and scarify them. It will help the seedling to sprout.
- Then soak these seeds in water for some days. Take lukewarm water for the same.
- The next step is stratification. This step needs to place the seeds in the refrigerator for around 4-6 weeks.
- Take some well-draining, loaming soil in a container and press the seeds into this small pot.
- Now place this pot in bright but indirect sunlight.
- It usually takes many weeks or a few months for the baby cactus to come out of the seed.
- Maintain a temperature of 70 to 80 degrees.
- These plant seeds also need humidity and moisture as well.
Tip – You can also use a seedling heat mat to help the plant grow from the seed.
How to Get Queen of the Night Flower to Bloom?
If you want to see your queen of the night flower bloom, you must provide it the right atmosphere to thrive. It should be kept in a place where it should not receive direct sunlight or proper lightning. If possible, place them in such a way that they can get some bit of morning light but not much, or it would damage the plant or burn the leaves.
The queen of the night flower plant blooms from spring until fall. So, January would be the best month to start feeding your plant and continue till October.
Queen of the Night Flower Common Issues
You may see your queen of the night flower plant having some issues that if ignored can kill your plant. Once you know about these issues, you will be better able to handle and help your plant grow healthily.
- Fungus
- Pests
- No Blooms
Fungus
It is a very common problem you might see in your queen of the night flower. The leaves of this plant are susceptible to fungal leaf spots, especially during spring.
If you see some fuzzy mold-like spots, you must immediately treat them with an antifungal spray. You can also put neem oil as it is a natural antifungal spray and will not affect the plant.
If you notice that fungus has almost destroyed your queen of the night, you can cut off some unaffected proportion and start propagating.
Pests
Some pests like mites, aphids, mealybugs, or slugs may treat the night cactus as their home. You can use a stream of water or cover the soil to avoid waterlogging to shoo them away. You can also spray natural insecticides or neem oil to kill these pesky bugs.
No Blooms
To help your queen of the night flower plant to bloom, make sure the nitrogen level of the soil is right as an excess of it will result in lesser blooms. Another factor to take care of is that it shouldn’t be exposed to too much sunlight. Just a little bit of morning sunlight or no direct light shall work. Apart from these, you can also fertilize your night cactus in spring and fall.
Queen of the Night Flower Colors
Though you must have seen most of the queen of the night flowers in White, but this flower comes in many other beautiful colors.
Pink Queen Of the Night Flower: You will see this pretty queen of the night flower plant in different shades of Pink ranging from soft pinks to neon-bright pink.
Red Queen of the Night Flower: Deep blood red color queen of the night flower looks amazingly beautiful.
Purple Queen Of the Night Flower: There’s no purple queen of the night flower but some white night queen flower has purple tipped hues.
Queen of the Night Flower Conclusion
Did you know that your favorite queen of the night flower plant can live up to 30 years if specific care is taken care of it. Giving enough space to let it grow will make you enjoy these beautiful blooms year after year. You can easily propagate and take care of your night cactus plant. If taken care of well, it grows up to ten feet or grows taller up to 20 feet outdoors.
Queen of the Night Flower FAQs
Only once a year. The queen of the night or night cactus flower blooms only once a year.
No. Queen of the night flower and Dragon fruit is not the same. Though they might look similar they’re not in actuality.
It has a sweet smell. It has a floral smell which is very warm and soft.
Queen of the night flower is nonpoisonous, but one may feel nausea or loss of appetite if consumed in large quantities.
Yes. Queen of the night is an indoor as well as outdoor plant.
Queen of the night blooms last for one or two hours only. Though it’s a beautiful flower but sadly it blooms just for few hours.
Queen of the night flower plants is toxic to dogs. Almost all parts of these plants can be poisonous to dogs or cats.
Other Houseplant Varieties
The queen of the night flower plant is one beautiful houseplant. There are many other marvelous houseplants that you may want to consider keeping at home to make your home look beautiful. Some of them are the Chinese money plant, Peace lily, Spider plant, Fiddle leaf fig, and many more.
Popular Houseplants
A few of houseplants are very common and popular and you may want to keep them at your home. These are easy to take care of and look beautiful. Let’s look at some of the most popular houseplants:
- Snake Plant
- Majesty Palm
- Lucky Bamboo
- Peace Lily
- Bromeliad
- Croton and many more.
Cacti
It’s a fact that some cacti make your home looks elegant. They can also be kept as a statement in your home. Though some cacti can be kept indoors others need a large area to spread out. Some of the known cacti house plants are Golden Barrel Cactus, Dancing Bones Cactus, Queen of the night cactus, etc. If you like keeping cacti at your home, you might want to avoid keeping the ones that grow taller. You might also need to take care of the light requirements of the soil.
About
Although the queen of the night flower seems difficult to maintain, seeing this flower blooming in the night can be your motivation. All you need to do is to take care of it nicely. But if you do, it would be totally worth waiting for her appearance.
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