Name that plant
Details:
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Date Photo Taken
10 / 16 / 2016
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Season Photo Was Taken
Fall
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Region Photo Was Taken
Southeast
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City
Hobe Sound
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State
Florida
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Posted by
Patrick McLeod
Notes:
In the last 4 years, a hibiscus Bush was removed from below our 2nd floor S.E. Florida condo, and a neighbor replaced it with a 2-3 foot tall cactus plant. In just approx 4 years, it’s grown into this crazy 14 foot tall cactus tree, with a bark covered round trunk and prickly pears for leaves! These cactus break off of it and root themselves around the base in the sand. So I brought 2 small ones home, and now they’ve grown multiple new prickly pear branches and doubled in height in 4 months.
Comments
Metrosideros Master Identifier says:
E komo mai! You’re very welcome!
October 18th, 2016 at 6:15pm
Patrick McLeod Apprentice says:
Thanks Metrosideros. I think that was one of the prickly pear species that had come up in my previous search for identification, but, like most prickly pear varieties, there weren’t any examples of plants with the same round, thick, gray bark covered trunk and limbs that can be easily seen in the plant in my photo above. Most examples are merely clumps of numerous prickly pears growing out of each other, with no obvious trunk or branches. But upon further searches, I did finally find a few photos of Opuntia cochenillifera with roundish trunks with bark. But again, the vast majority of these cacti seem to be much thicker and less ‘tree-like’ than ours.
October 18th, 2016 at 6:37pm
Metrosideros Master Identifier says:
Looks like Opuntia cochenillifera, Nopalea. http://www.cactiguide.com/cactus/?genus=Opuntia&species=cochenillifera
October 17th, 2016 at 2:16pm