How to Make Your Christmas Cactus Bloom This Season With 8 Easy Tips

Christmas cacti have become well-loved as houseplants, as their long lifespans and unusual wintertime blooming season make them a fun and unique addition to the home, and a vibrant plant to display during the holiday season.

While these lovely cacti naturally bloom during the winter season, getting those beautiful, tubular flowers to pop up at the right time is a bit more of a challenge. Thankfully, all it takes is proper care, attention, and a few little tricks to get your Christmas cactus blooming and thriving throughout the winter.

When Does a Christmas Cactus Usually Bloom?

In general, the Christmas cactus's typical blooming period falls between November and January. However, it's specific blooming window is dependent primarily on its light and temperature levels, which is how you can take some control over your plant's behavior.

Christmas cacti bloom on their own when they have the right combination of light and temperature conditions, which it may surprise you to know are cooler temperatures and limited light. That's what makes these cacti so prone to flower during the short, cold days of early winter.

How to Get Your Christmas Cactus to Bloom

Whether your plant bloomed for the season and you want to encourage it to bloom again, or it is hesitant to bloom and you're hoping to have flowers in time for the holidays, there are ways to trick your cactus into producing blooms.

1. These easygoing cacti will be prone to put out blooms if they experience about a week straight of long nights and shorter days. Once your area is experiencing this naturally, just putting your cactus in a windowsill and letting it experience the natural cycle of days will help encourage blooms, since it will be subject to 12 or more hours of darkness per day, as it prefers. Don't expose your plant to any artificial light at night.
2. They also like cooler temperatures, so keep Christmas cacti away from heaters and radiators (as much as this may feel counterintuitive to some of your typical cacti) and instead leave it in a cool windowsill or lesser-used room where temps may be between 55 and 60 degrees.
3. Finally, reduce your watering schedule if you want your cactus to bloom. Water only when the soil is dry to the touch, and then only water about the top inch of your plant. This will provide your cactus with the push into its dormancy state and it can start to flower.

5 Care Tips for Christmas Cactus

Taking great care of your Christmas cactus and ensuring it produces beautiful blooms year after year isn't just about providing the right conditions a few weeks a year.

Overall, the more you follow best care practices for this charming plant, the more it will reward you will lovely flowers in the winter and healthy green foliage the rest of the year.

Here are some top care tips for year-round Christmas cactus ownership.

1. Don't overwater. A soggy or waterlogged Christmas cactus isn't a happy one. However, you also want to keep the soil evenly moist, so using a spray bottle throughout the year can work well.
2. Use a rich, fertile soil and add additional compost if you can.
3. Throughout the year, provide your cactus with moderate light and occasional direct sun. Constant direct sun will be too much for this rainforest-dweller that's used to filter light.
4. During the growing season (not blooming season), use a high-potassium fertilizer every two weeks, once buds have appeared.
5. After a successful flowering season, it's time to replant your Christmas cactus into a new, somewhat larger container so it can continue to grow over the next year.