cactus

     

See also taxonomy of the Cactaceae

Trivia about cactus

  • Arizona's state bird is a wren named for this type of plant
  • The barrel species of this spiny plant can bring a touch of the desert into your home
  • The night-blooming cereus, which blooms for just one night a year, is a type of this succulent
  • Closely related to the Saguaro, night-blooming Cereus is a type of this plant
  • Indians of the southwest U.S. once used the curved spines of the barrel kind of this plant as fishhooks
  • Put the golden barrel or saguaro type of this plant in your mouth only if you want pierced lips
  • Ouch! I'd better scrape the thorns off the nopal type of this desert plant before I cook it
  • Phonograph needles have been made from the spines of some species of this desert plant, lamp bases from others
  • 2 varieties of this desert plant are named for holidays: Christmas & Easter
  • The cochineal insect, the source of a red dye, feeds on the prickly pear type of this plant
  • Make sure you remove the thorns before eating nopales, the leaves of the prickly pear type of this
  • This plant family native to America originally had leaves, but they evolved into spines
  • Species of this plant include the jumpng cholla, barrel & organ pipe
  • Many of the 2,000 species of this prickly plant burst open when more water is taken in than can be stored
  • The night-blooming cereus, a climbing type of this desert plant, blooms for only one night
  • Every March a Phoenix garden show is devoted to this desert plant & other succulents
  • The Organ Pipe species of this desert plant is named for the long stems which resemble the pipes of an organ
  • Repotting this warm-weather plant "can be a sticky situation unless you have... carpet scraps to handle" it
  • The prickly pear, or Indian fig, is neither a pear nor a fig; it's a type of this succulent
  • There are about 50 species of the hedgehog type of this plant, so named for its spiny fruit
  • To tell these from other succulents, look for the areoles, small cushionlike structures the spines grow from
  • Common in the Southwestern U.S., the Strawberry Hedgehog belongs to this family of plants