Cactus Garden

[castanea]

A good source for hard to find yucca seeds:

www.alplains.com/

[catherinenm]

Here are plants.

www.highcountrygardens.com/catalog/browse/cacti-and-succulents

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Aug 14, 2014 17:05:46 GMT -5 copse said:

flowerweaver, I am in NZ, so no USDA zones. We get down to -10C I guess at an extreme, though I've not seen it. If zone 4 is down to -25C, then prickly pear, here I come. I was under the impression that they wouldn't deal well with frost.

I grow a number of species of cactus in USDA Zone 4b, −32°C (−25°F) to −29°C (−20°F).

It seems to me that it's not so much the cold that does them in but moisture. Because I have clay soil I typically put down 6" of coarse gravel, and then 6" of 70:30 sand/compost.

I am growing:

Cylindropuntia arbuscula (barely survives)
Cylindropuntia echinocarpa (surviving, but not thriving)
Cylindropuntia imbricata (thriving in one bed, died out in others)
Opuntia basilaris
Opuntia fragilis
Opuntia polyacantha (Native species that thrives)
Opuntia, small and fuzzy.
Opuntia, humifusa. Produces lots of fruit that doesn't quite ripen in the available season.
Opuntias, 3 plants of unknown species that I grew from seed. They have survived about 8 winters. They might flower next year.
Pediocactus simpsonii




Planted but died out:
Echinocereus triglochidiatus
agave utahensis
A few other kinds of opuntia
A few kinds of yucca

And growing in the greenhouse:
Something akin to Opuntia maxima. We prune it each fall to get it through the door to go back into the greenhouse.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Aug 15, 2014 2:10:32 GMT -5 copse said:

Thanks Joseph, any chance of pictures of your cactus beds if you get the chance?

The beds growing in the honest desert are not very suitable to photography. The plants blend in so much that it's hard to see much in photos of the whole bed, so I take specimen photos. This is what those look like after about 5 to 6 growing seasons. There's a couple hundred feet of row, but hard to see them. Opuntia polyacantha.


A more formal bed in the deep desert containing some cholla, pediocactus, and different kinds of opuntia. After this photo was taken an animal liked the rock border, and dug a hole burying the two closest cactus and killing them.


A bed closer to home a year after it was planted:


The same bed in its 4th year:


And in its 5th year this spring, about 2 weeks later in the growing season. What isn't readily visible are the seedlings. They are 5 to 8 years old and still too small to show up in these photos.


And finally. A mystery plant that grows in the desert. (Edit two years later to ID it as Caulanthus crassicaulist)

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Tonight I started 9 germination tests with Opuntia humifusa under varying conditions. Testing to determine best germination temperature, and whether scarification or cold stratification helps with germination.

[keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.)]

I have a nice prickly pear cactus growing in a pot. It's been happily growing there for several years. Not sure what specific type it is, but it is native to the area. I believe the one i have has yellow flowers, but i've seen some with pink. Honestly i think i like the pink ones better. It seems to change to dark off color ever few years though, i'm not sure if that means it needs some sort of fertilizer or something or if that's normal. I like to harvest the fruits. Prickly pear fruit jam is great, i don't think i've ever harvested enough to make my own yet, and the seeds take up quite a bit of room. Those cactus seeds sure are as rocks on ones teeth!

I found this little gem in a magazine the other day. I might try to order one.
www.territorialseed.com/product/Luther_Burbanks_Thornless_Opuntia_Prickly_Pear/prickly_pear

Have you found a use for that mystery plant yet? Or do you just grow it because it brings you joy in a "connect with the native nature" kind of way i sometimes like to do. I've found the gel in prickly pear cactus works just as well as Aloe Vera gel on sunburns.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

My cactus is an Opuntia, which indicates to me that it's never really possible to be certain of species identification.

I think of Opuntia not so much as containing species, but as containing complexes: In other words, a whole bunch of closely-related cross-fertile sub-species that have sometimes been called separate species, and have sometimes been called the same species. I consider O. humifusa to be more like a clade or a hybrid swarm. I think of Opuntia macrorhiza as a sub-species in the Humifusa clade. The definition of macro-rhiza is big-rooted, so I would guess that's how to distinguish if from it's close kin in the species complex. Additionally, there are diploid, triploid, tetraploid, and pentaploid members of the Humifusa species complex which can mess with identifications based on plant morphology.

What I am calling O. humifusa came to me from the Eastern US. And from a cultivated garden, so no telling where the wild form originated. This particular clone has very few spines, so it is not at all suited for growing in the wildlands where the animals eat spineless opuntia like it was candy.

Opuntia humifusa:


Opuntia humifusa, closeup of flowers:

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Jan 18, 2016 15:04:28 GMT -5 keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.) said:

Have you found a use for that mystery plant yet?

The mystery plant is Caulanthus crassicaulis, a wild cabbage. I brought some of it home with me for a species-domestication project. It tastes like kale. Not my favorite taste, but it's pretty popular around here.

Caulanthus crassicaulis

[steev]

Keen101: that Burbank's Thornless Opuntia is a tad over-hyped; apparently when publicizing it, he would shave the pads before rubbing them on his cheek; there's a patch on Jack London's place; he thought they might serve as fodder for cattle, not spineless enough, though.

[keen101 (Biolumo / Andrew B.)]

Jan 18, 2016 21:48:53 GMT -5 steev said:

Keen101: that Burbank's Thornless Opuntia is a tad over-hyped; apparently when publicizing it, he would shave the pads before rubbing them on his cheek; there's a patch on Jack London's place; he thought they might serve as fodder for cattle, not spineless enough, though.

Thanks steve, still might be worth buying though. Yes i was aware that the description states that they are nearly spineless. I take that to mean spineless except for the tiny microscopic hairs. Still better than nothing and impressive for traditional breeding. Still should help in cactus fruit harvesting i would think. ...now just to wait for the first gmo prickly pear cactus that is made completley spineless through genetic engineering.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

The cactus I see most commonly around here is Opuntia polyacantha. It is another one of those species-complexes so the traits vary widely from plant to plant. It would be distinguishable from O. humifusa by the shape and size of the seeds. O. polyacantha has huge seeds compared to O. humifusa. I tend to be farming during the time of year that cactus seeds mature, so I haven't noticed O. humifusa in the wild around here. I'll start paying attention. I'm generally unwilling to dig up cactus plants to see how big their roots are... I dug some up one time to transplant them out of a roadway that was being built. Other than situations like that, I hold cactus as being sacred. It's like cutting down a tree. Not something that I undertake lightly. I know that back east, trees grow like weeds. Out here we plant hundreds of trees hoping that one or two will survive. The survival rate of cactus is better, but not by much.

Typical Opuntia polyacantha (in this area).


A species more common south of here is Opuntia basilaris:

[steev]

I've tried sticking some cactus on the farm, but they haven't taken; I've got an ornamental columnar to put in now; I hope to establish some Opuntia, just because I like a bit of nopales on a taco.

Tuna aren't bad, either, although seedy as hell.

[reed]

Ours looks similar and it all has lots of spines. Some grows pretty much just sprawling on the ground and some stands up maybe a couple of feet. I just thought it was all the same thing growing different in different conditions but now I wonder if it's different varieties. I don't grow it because it borders on invasive and the spines are awful, especially the tiny red ones that surround the longer ones. I'm not sure that the longer ones don't act as a trigger to eject red ones.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Opuntias have a wide range of cold-tolerance. Many are not cold-hardy in zone 4b. Their range can be extended by planting them into well drained soil.

Opuntias that have survived for me are:
Opuntia polyacantha
Opuntia humifusa
Opuntia fragilis
Opuntia basilaris

Pediocactus simpsonii is the second most common cactus that I see in this area.

I also grow Cylindropuntia imbricata, but it only survived in one of the three locations that I planted it. It is thriving in that location.

Cylindropuntia imbricata:


I grow a few small ball-type cacti. They are surviving, but not thriving. One of them is Echinocereus triglochidiatus, I don't have names for the others. Cylindropuntia arbuscula just won't die. But it's currently smaller than when it went into the ground around 7 years ago. Cylindropuntia echinocarpa is likewise surviving, and slowly increasing in size.

A typical landscape:


At the Desert Research Station, practically an oasis with all those trees.


At the end of the rainy season:


Even deeper out in the desert:

[steev]

I've got some columnars that I need to plant out; I need some nopales; there are some a 1000' lower that I must check out.

I do enjoy nopales in a quesadilla, so I guess I need to get it on.