That thing doesn't look like it'd hurt much if you touched it.
That was my mistaken thought about two weeks ago at Stone Mountain in Georgia. I picked one up with my bare hands and got hundreds of little thorns in my fingers. One of them broke off under my skin and I have an infection in my thumb at this very moment from it.
Prickley pears and some of their relatives have glochids, tiny barbed spines. They may, or may not, also have large spines. The two young stem pads in the picture are what Mexicans call nopales. They are used as a vegitable. I think the fat spiny looking things on them are leaves, but don't quote me. I'm also not sure when the glochids are produced in growth, so be careful in any case.
Prickly pears in Delaware? Is this a single specimen that is grown in the park, or do they normally occur there? I don't think any cacti naturally grow that far north, at least in the east. There are some prickly pears (Opuntia) and Escobaria tubercle-bearing cacti in western Canada, but don't ask me which species.
"I think the fat spiny looking things on them are leaves, but don't quote me."
Yes, they're leaves. Actually, all cacti have leaves (at least the young shoots), but in the subfamily Cactoideae (which includes most cacti, but not the prickly pears) they're extremely small. There are even broad-leaved trees and shrubs (Pereskia) that don't look like cacti at all.
Looking at lyman Benson's "The Cacti of the United States and Canada", Opuntia humifusa goes north up to Cape Cod. There are some others in Western Canada, as said. A friend in Venezuela had Preskia in a pot on the porch. The leaf-cutter ants liked it.
That thing doesn't look like it'd hurt much if you touched it.
That was my mistaken thought about two weeks ago at Stone Mountain in Georgia. I picked one up with my bare hands and got hundreds of little thorns in my fingers. One of them broke off under my skin and I have an infection in my thumb at this very moment from it.
A valuable lesson learned.
Prickley pears and some of their relatives have glochids, tiny barbed spines. They may, or may not, also have large spines. The two young stem pads in the picture are what Mexicans call nopales. They are used as a vegitable. I think the fat spiny looking things on them are leaves, but don't quote me. I'm also not sure when the glochids are produced in growth, so be careful in any case.
Prickly pears in Delaware? Is this a single specimen that is grown in the park, or do they normally occur there? I don't think any cacti naturally grow that far north, at least in the east. There are some prickly pears (Opuntia) and Escobaria tubercle-bearing cacti in western Canada, but don't ask me which species.
"I think the fat spiny looking things on them are leaves, but don't quote me."
Yes, they're leaves. Actually, all cacti have leaves (at least the young shoots), but in the subfamily Cactoideae (which includes most cacti, but not the prickly pears) they're extremely small. There are even broad-leaved trees and shrubs (Pereskia) that don't look like cacti at all.
Looking at lyman Benson's "The Cacti of the United States and Canada", Opuntia humifusa goes north up to Cape Cod. There are some others in Western Canada, as said. A friend in Venezuela had Preskia in a pot on the porch. The leaf-cutter ants liked it.
Ah, thanks! I didn't know that.