These plants aren’t the foolproof bloomers everyone claims they are – at least not without some specific conditions.
I’ve killed blooms with kindness, moved plants at exactly the wrong moment, and learned the hard way that “easy care” doesn’t mean “blooms on command.”
So I tested what actually works, talked to someone who knows their stuff, and figured out where I’d been going wrong.
Some of these tips surprised me, and that closet trick everyone swears by? Not quite what you think.
Tip 1: Darkness is Your Secret Weapon (But Not How You Think)
You’ve probably heard you need to stick your Thanksgiving Cactus in a dark closet for weeks. Not really.
What these plants actually need is consistent darkness at night, 12 to 14 hours of uninterrupted darkness, to be exact.
That means no streetlights streaming through windows, no bathroom light left on, no quick midnight phone checks near the plant.
I tested this by covering mine with a cardboard box each evening starting in early October. Six weeks later? Buds appeared like clockwork.
The trick isn’t total darkness – it’s consistent darkness during nighttime hours, which signals the plant that winter is coming and it’s time to bloom.
