Key Issues

Beer for hydration, cigarette ash for food. Works wonders. Oh, and Miracle-Gro for sustenance. I myself am very fond of aloe. You can't hurt it, and it provides so much in return.

Black spots sounds like a fungus. I think you might have watered it too much... Maybe too much water at once, or someone else watered it when you weren't looking. Otherwise I got nothing. Good luck.

Sing to it. I swear plants like to hear you sing to them. But I also agree with the fungus theory about your venereal-diseased cactus. Try this:

I know you don't smoke, but get some cigarette butts (or whole cigarettes), tear off the filters and steep the tobacco in hot water as if you were making tea. Use a coffee filter or an old foot out of some panty-hose to make your tea-bag.

Take the nicotine water and feed it to your plant every other day for a week. Don't give it too much at once, just enough to wet the soil in the pot, and drip some over the cactus itself.

Trust me. It works on almost anything.

Acidman is Voodooman? Damn.

I agree with V-man. Cigarette Ash, and don't mix it with anything, except a little aloe syrup. I'm not kidding.

Never forget that Acidman once farmed a half-acre of land and spent a lot of time talking about plant maladies at Webb's Feed and Seed. Nicotine is not only a great insecticide, but a good remedy for fungus, too.

Wanna make a REAL batch of fix-it-all spray?

Take a whole plug of chewing tobaco and make tea out of it. Drink some really rotten beer and piss it out into a quart jar. Add one cup of baby shampoo. Toss in one cup of red pepper, and the vinegar out of some pickled habenero, or use about one-half a bottle of habenero extract.

Mix that disgusting shit together with water at about a 5-parts mix to 20 parts water ratio. Spray it on ALL of your plants. It will either kill or run off everything that is bothering you.

You need to apply a light spray about every two weeks, but if you mix one batch of my recipe, it will last all summer on a half-acre garden.

A little of that stuff goes a long way.

Just a guess, but based on your description and the fact that you haven't killed it, that first plant is probably a pothos vine. They're nearly indestructible.

Okay, I have been reminded via email that it is a spider plant, and no, it isn't quite as sturdy as the aloe, but then, nothing is... ;)

Acidman, do you REALLY use that mixture on your foliage? I'd be sick if I attempted to mix that, could barely stomach reading it!

nicotine juice is definitely the way to go. It kills damn near everything bad and keeps the bugs off the rest. Just don't spray too much of it on anything you want to eat....