Last month, we transported several of our California cactus collection to Arizona. My beavertail cactus (opuntia basilaris – thanks Crotalus 😉 ) was among those we brought. Today, the first of several flower buds opened.
According to Desert Tropicals, beavertail is a smaller prickly pear cactus, and it will often start blooming when it has only two pads. In the wild, its principal range is limited to the Mojave-Colorado desert. The cactus ranges in the southwest USA (Arizona, California, Nevada) from 200 to 3000 feet elevation.
We will get this cactus transplanted into the rock and cactus garden next week. Meanwhile, enjoy the pretty flowers. Click on the image to enlarge.
Do they have any fragrance, or is it not wise NOT to try and smell them?
Anytime, Damsel. BTW, I recall you were saying that you didn’t want cacti in your courtyard because of the spines, but I have a possible candidate: Echinocereus rigidissimus var. rubrispinus. E. r. var. rigidissimus is the Arizona Rainbow Cactus, and you can find it around Benson, Sierra Vista, and Bisbee. Var. rubrispinus comes from Mexico, and is grown here a lot. It’s a much richer red, as well. But the key with these cacti is the spines are very short, and they lie tight against the body of the plant, so there’s very little risk of getting stabbed.
Drjim, I don’t know if they have a fragrance or not, but you should be able to get close enough to smell them without getting hurt. Just watch out for those glochids, the nasty tiny bristles that come loose and dig in your skin. 😯
I dont think they have a fragrance. We have some that bloom and smell like fresh ocean air. . but sweeter. We just bought one hopefully I’ll have a picture in a couple weeks. Huge white flowers. The clippings we brought with us won’t have flowers for at least a year or more. The golden torch and the cereus have huge white flowers very fragrant.
Sometimes the flowers are so beautiful they dont need to smell.
Cool. I don’t think I’ve ever owned a cactus that flowered. I’ve had Jade Trees that got big enough to flower, and right now our lemon tree is flowering like crazy. Makes the back yard smell really nice!
And with all the rain we’ve had, we’ll probably get a bumper crop of lemons in the next few weeks!
Cactus is prolly less work then a jade tree.People like to make bonsais outta the jade trees. Those are work.
We are gonna try a lemon and Orange trees here also.