Friday, May 04, 2007

Cactus Flower

No, not the Goldie Hawn movie, although I'm reminded of that every time I see a blooming cactus.

No, it's the time of year where I live when the prickly pear cactus puts on a dazzling show of bright greenish-yellow flowers. Especially when water has been plentiful and the sun is getting hot. Yes, we've had a very wet Spring.

You've seen the yuccas in out back yard. Well, in our desire to landscape with (mostly) plants native to this area -- which therefore need little special care! -- we planted some spineless prickly pear out at the end of our driveway. Here's what greeted me when I arrived home from work today.


Well, I just had to grab the camera and get some shots of the individual blooms. Here are four, side-by-side, all growing on one pad:


And here's a close-up on one particluarly pretty bloom:

Want to take a peek down inside the flower? Here's what it looks like zoomed in close:


And finally, a shot of a bloom that seemed to have more petals than most and was almost ball-shaped:


Lest I bore you, I'll stop there.

8 comments:

kenju said...

John, those cactus flowers are gorgeous!! Do you read Naomi, of Here in the Hills? She has a cactus garden you might like to see! Let me know if you want the link.

Anonymous said...

Very pretty. I love the intimate closeups of the stamen and pistels or whatever we used to call them in Botany 101. (I daydreamed a lot during that class.)

Anonymous said...

Super pictures.

Badabing said...

Great pics John. I'd better not show them to my wife...or she'll want to move to Texas.

Anonymous said...

These are really great pics and I especially like the last one.

Karyn Lyndon said...

Not bad for flowers gone wild...

P.S. I thought Bubble was a girl panda...

Anonymous said...

I never think of Texas as being especially pretty - mostly hot and dry with a lot of those oil rig things covering the landscape. And I certainly never imagined that a cactus could have such beautiful flowers. Very interesting. You are educating me about your state.

Candace said...

Spectacular, John! Great pics.
And what a treat to come home to!

Xeriscaping is catching on up here in Dallas, too. Good on ya.