Cactus Garden

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Last weekend I planted another garden: It is about 450 square feet of desert. I planted around 90 cactus plants of 5 species that I have been growing in plastic pots for the last year. That adds to the 30 square foot cactus garden I planted a few years ago that has around 15 species growing in it.

Sorry the photos didn't turn out.

One nice thing about planting in a non-irrigated desert is that the weeding is so close to zero as to be almost non-existent. (In the three year old bed, I have only pulled one weed.)

While I was at it, I planted Painted Mountain corn Hopi style in a few areas that I expect might retain enough moisture to produce a crop.

Regards,
Joseph

[atash]

I have two Opuntias and a cute little Echinocereus. Opuntia pads are OK as a vegetable. The Echinocereus has never made any fruit. Might need to be cross-pollinated. No idea if the fruit is any good. Opuntias usually have bland fruit.

Those are among the very few Cacti possible here; winters are too rainy for most of them.

If I lived in the tropics, I'd grow Hylocereus undulatus and its relations, for their fruits. They're pretty good.

[ottawagardener]

I have an Opuntina which made it through winter and seems to be producing a flowerbud but many of the pads died back so I don't think I'll be trying it anytime soon unless it gives me a fruit. Once we get settled somewhere, I plan on making a hardy xeriscape bed with some edibles that like sharp drainage and drier soil. It should be a fun challenge.

There are a couple prairie species that I'd like to try like Poppy Mallow in that setting.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

May 21, 2010 7:23:10 GMT -5 ottawagardener said:

There are a couple prairie species that I'd like to try like Poppy Mallow in that setting.

If I were to try to feed my family out in the desert, I imagine that mallows would be one of the food crops. And biscuit rooted parsley. And some kind of spring bulb.

I've always loved cactus. I keep planting species out there that are supposedly cold tolerant, and some survive, but many croak. My big surprise this spring was that an agave survived, after it's siblings croaked in 3 beds closer to home.

Regards,
Joseph

[atash]

Agaves are surprisingly coldhardy overall. Well, except the really deep-tropical types.

You probably already know that A. utahensis is native to your home state. That and a few others tolerate fairly cold climates if dry in winter.

There is actually a cactus native to western Washington, but it is not much to look at: Opuntia fragilis. Just little non-descript nubbins with spines. Widespread and not very picky about habitat as long as it is open ground or at least grassland, and drains well. It occurs in a few places in the rainshadow of the Olympics.

Cacti and other succulents seem to be mostly Gondwanic relicts. Back before Gondwanaland broke up, it probably contained vast deserts in its interior, which was too far from ocean to have much rain. The edges of that dessert is probably where a lot of succulent plants originated.

They occur mostly in the extreme north and south of Africa--but rare in the African tropics--on the island of Madegascar which has extensive (but threatened) xeric floras, a few in India (India is Gondwanic), and in the Americas. South America is Gondwanic and North America is not, but Cacti seem to have migrated into North America quickly and very successfully; one of the 3 major centers of distribution for the family is Mexico. Oddly though as successful as Cacti are in the Americas, only a single species ever left the Americas without human help (the ubiquitous Opuntias of the Old World tropics and subtropics are feral, generally originating with schemes to use O. ficus-indica as livestock food), and that was an epiphytic species whose seeds were carried to Africa in the bellies of migrating birds. It occurs on both sides of the Atlantic and is spreading east.

Cactaceae seems to be by far the most successful succulent family. Cacti occur naturally in every US state except Rhode Island. Most succulents are extreme relics, such as Aizooaceae, about 99.9% of species only occur in Africa (there are maybe 4-5 species occurring elsewhere), and only south of the tropics at that. Most advanced species of plants that grow in deserts are geophytes (having bulbs, tubers, rhizomes, or other subterranean storage organs) and annuals, not succulents.

The most astonishing xerics I am aware of are not succulents, geophytes, annuals, or even moisture attractors like Tillandsias that can live off dew and fog that are amazing in their own right: they are "resurrection plants" that can survive essentially total dessication, and then revivify. That ability is rarer than succulence.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YYdgqZaXCc

[cortona]

i'm another cacty entusiast.
i have around 400 cactus mostly of the astrophytum genus and especialy cultivar of it!
one of the mostly cold and umid tollerant cactus i know is tricocereus, i have schidkenansy in soil and it live happy in my absolutely wst winter, i have friends that have tricocereus pachanoy in soil and it survive snow too!
i know at least another specie that is cold hardy in my clinmate(this winter we have -8 c ) but in this moment i have to read a book to remember the name.
if somebody wants to try sowing astrophytum fel free to pm me i have tousands of it!
Emanuele

[atash]

Cortona, you're in Italy aren't you? Is winter rain the problem?

Trichocereus chilensis is one of the very few cacti native to a Mediterranean-rainfall-pattern climate. Cacti lack mechanisms to transport excessive moisture out of their tissues during cold weather. Opuntias come from dry-winter climates, but some of them aren't even native to deserts, but just open grassland or even in sandy or gravelly areas of high rainfall climates, and as a result they tend to be tolerant as long as drainage is good.

[Hristo]

Speaking of desert plants does anyone can tell me how is the taste of Yucca baccata's fruit? I tried to grow it some years ago, but lost it (neglected it). Now I'm trying again. I suppose it will grow well in my climate since Yucca filamentosa is common here. Also I know it needs hand pollination to produce fruits here due to lack of that specific moth. But how about it's fruit? Is it good tasting?

[blueadzuki]

May 22, 2010 1:08:46 GMT -5 atash said:

Cortona, you're in Italy aren't you? Is winter rain the problem?

Trichocereus chilensis is one of the very few cacti native to a Mediterranean-rainfall-pattern climate. Cacti lack mechanisms to transport excessive moisture out of their tissues during cold weather. Opuntias come from dry-winter climates, but some of them aren't even native to deserts, but just open grassland or even in sandy or gravelly areas of high rainfall climates, and as a result they tend to be tolerant as long as drainage is good.

I'm probably dead wrong about this, but I would think that Pereskia i.e. the cactus that is everything a normal cactus isn't (woody stemmed, non-succulent, and possesed of large non-succulent leaves) migh do alrights as well. The area most of the species are native to does get periodic rainy seasons so it presumbly has effective ways of ridding itself of excess water (actually as a non-succulent, i'm not sure if it even stores much water in it's above ground tissues) Plus if the species you are growing is P. aculeata, I understand the fruit is delicios.

[ottawagardener]

Hristo: Never tried them but am hoping to have a taste of Yucca filamentosa though they are not considered very good - a bit bitter because of the saponin. Mine have emerged from winter a bit weary looking.

[atash]

Also I know it needs hand pollination to produce fruits here due to lack of that specific moth.

Hawk moths probably? Usually anything pollinated by giant moths is also attractive to and can be pollinated by bats. But I dunno if European bats have any interest in flowers--Europe does not seem to have any native flowers designed for bat pollination! LOL

[Hristo]

Telsing, I do not know if Yucca filamentosa's fruit taste any good, but read that baccata's are the best among the US species.

Atash, yes Europe is poor of bat species - only about 35 out of 1100+ as I see. Between 29-33 of them live and in Bulgaria, but all of them are only insectivorous.

[stevil]

After about 10-years my Yucca filamentosa finally flowered - the flowers make for an attractive salad.



As far as I've seen this is the furthest north flowering Yucca. Sadly, the plant died after flowering (no side shoots developed)and I'd forgotten about the hand pollination thing...... I still have a Yucca glauca (about 7-8 years old) but probably some years off flowering...

In our wet summers/winters Opuntias are not easy. I grow a couple of species outside - Opuntia fragilis and O. polyacantha - on a sand bed and I cover by a window in winter to keep the dampness away. It looks as though fragilis has made it through our severe winter, but polyacantha not....

[ottawagardener]

Very beautiful indeed!

I was thinking of covering the opuntia with something this year too for that reason. I live on very well drained soil and several pads seem to have made it but I would have liked a better survival. Here, the Yucca filamentosa, will make offsets at least some of the time. Or at least, I'm pretty sure I've seen this behaviour. It grows from root cuttings very well (ie, I can't seem to transplant it all in one go...).

[keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.)]

I just bought some seeds of Yucca baccata. It's a plant i know will do well here in the arid climate. I know because there are many wild yucca plants around here (I just don't know what kind). I look forward to growing yucca plants that produce large fruits!


p.s. i've always wondered if Saguaro cactus would grow here. Perhaps the snow in the winter is too much for it to handle? I think someday i will try anyway.