Damsel

I didn’t put up a picture of the first saguaro flower on our “big guy” cactus because it was in an awkward place to photograph. Click on the the link to take you to a profile view of the first blossom which was directly behind the second-to-open flower bud when it was open.

In the view above, you can see the inside of the flower a little better. Click on the image to enlarge.

The big saguaro has dozens of flower buds, so we should be in business with many flowers to open over the next few weeks. I just love springtime in the desert!

For the second time this spring, our Argentine Giant Cactus (Echinopsis candicans) had two flowers open. They were out last night, but I waited to take this photo until this morning when they were fully open and the light was good.

This is a single stem cactus at present, but the species can spread out by producing more stems and can occupy a large area. In its present location, we can’t allow it to spread too much, so we will remove and replant other stems should they occur.

I’m not certain, but we may be getting a third bloom in a while since there seems to be another fuzzy patch that may develop into another flower. That would be nice. The flowers are are beautiful and fragrant. Click on the image to enlarge.

Many of the little flower buds in this cluster on our ocotillo are now open. We saw them coming, but now they’re here. We have waited for quite some time for flowers since this specimen replaced the dead ocotillo last year.

This is one of three flower clusters currently opening on the ocotillo. There are seven or eight “canes” or stalks, but only two are showing flower clusters. The other cane with flowers actually has two clusters, one growing on a separate branch near the top of the cane.

Some of the more mature ocotillos we see around town and in the desert are showing flowers on nearly every cane. We’re hoping that our plant will follow suit in a year or two.

This picture was taken about mid morning when the light was fairly good to capture this view of the flower cluster. Click on the image to enlarge.

The ‘big guy’ out front has more flower buds. This is a small section of one of the upper arms where the buds get bigger each day. I tried to count the number of buds, but lost count when I could not quite see what was on top of the arms of the cactus. I got to about two dozen when I gave up.

This photo is of the same area on the same arm of the cactus I posted last week. I’m sure we will have dozens of flowers this year. Maybe we will get on the garage roof when the flowers start to open to get some photos from that vantage point.

Click on the image to enlarge.

These nice showy flowers are open on our Lawyer’s Tongue Cactus (opuntia engelmannii var. linguiformis). This cactus, which is now over three feet tall started from a single paddle that we rescued from a local park in 2011. We planted the paddle in a pot and it thrived in the courtyard until last winter when we transplanted it to the west side of the lot.

This is the first year that it is producing flowers and (hopefully) fruit. We would like to try and use the fruit in some recipes for syrup, juice or jellies. Maybe we will even make some Lawyer’s Tongue Margaritas this summer.