The Core Dump

The Core Dump is the personal blog of Nic Lindh, a Swedish-American pixel-pusher living in Phoenix, Arizona.

By Nic Lindh on Tuesday, 18 April 2006

A good year for cactus

It’s the time of the year when the cactuses of the Sonoran desert bloom, and while not exactly a riot of color, there’s something very special about seeing the rugged and blandly colored plants extrude fragile flowers.

Cactus in Bloom

Prickly Pear in bloom. Click for larger view.

And here’s a closer shot of one of the flowers:

Closer view

Mmm … buttery. Click for larger view.

According to the always interesting Wikipedia, the almost-invisible hairy spines on genus Opuntia are called glochids. They’re what you spend quite a lot of time removing from your skin with a pair of tweezers if you get too close to one of these bad boys.

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