While not exactly a place where you can grow everything (no true tropicals or cold weather species), southern California is the next best thing to heaven when it comes to gardening potential. Inland parts of the coastal basins border on desert conditions while still having enough rainfall and lower temperatures to keep everything from looking like the land over the nearby mountains. One of the hallmarks of the inland regions would be the numerous cacti grown in most yards, most of them exotic introductions that grow far to the north of their usual haunts, but do just fine here because of the mild winters reasonably devoid of frost that such places experience.
In the spirit of Cactus Weekend (who knows, it could become a real thing one day), here are two such beauties that qualify for inclusion on a blog about things of natural North America.
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| Indian-Fig Prickly Pear (Opuntia Ficus-Indica) taken in a private garden... er... mess in Fontana, California. |
This pear, as you can see, is quite capable of trunking. Its pads cup a little bit, and you can see one in flower here. This cactus is native to central Mexico, and gets planted anywhere warm enough not to hurt it with bouts of cold less than 20 degrees Fahrenheit. They seem really fond of them in Virginia Beach, and they can handle moist as well as desert conditions.
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Wheel Cactus (Opuntia Robusta) taken in a private garden in Claremont, California.
This cactus also trunks and features striking pale blue pads. I have never seen one in flower, but apparently they send up bright yellow blooms. They are native and endemic to the southern Chihuahuan Desert in central Mexico. In my travels I have only seem them cultivated in southern California, and only in the Los Angeles basin and surrounding basins and valleys.
Stop by tomorrow for a change into something non-prickly.
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