Opuntia polyacantha |
Opuntia ellisiana |
|||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
hair-spine prickly pear, panhandle prickly pear, plains prickly pear, starvation prickly-pear |
tigertongue |
|||||||||||||||||
Habit | Shrubs, low, 10–25 cm, with ± prostrate branches. | Shrubs, low, spreading, to 2 m. Stem segments strongly interconnected, blue-green, flattened, obovate to ovate or circular, 15–25 × 10–20 cm, glaucous, low tuberculate, glabrous; areoles 5–7 per diagonal row across midstem segment, often fan-shaped with small circular extensions at base, 2.5–5(–10) mm diam., base surrounded by glabrous yellow lip; wool white, aging blackish. | ||||||||||||||||
Stem | segments not easily detached, green, elliptic to narrowly to broadly obovate to circular, 4–27 × 2–18 cm, low tuberculate; areoles 4–14 per diagonal row across midstem segment, subcircular, 3–6 mm; wool tan to brown. |
|||||||||||||||||
Spines | at all or only distal areoles of stem segment, terete to flattened, stout to acicular to bristlelike, straight to curling, of 1 or 2 kinds; if 1 kind: 0–18 per areole, spreading and curling in various directions, sometimes straight, erect, ascending to deflexed, yellow to dark brown to black, turning gray, pink-gray to gray-brown, longest (35–)40–90(–185) mm; if ± 2 kinds: major spines (0–)1–5, reflexed to porrect, yellow-brown to brown to gray, longest 20–150 mm; minor spines (0–)5–11, deflexed, white to white-gray, longest 4–16 mm. |
absent or vestigial, yellow. |
||||||||||||||||
Glochids | inconspicuous, in narrow, tidy crescent at adaxial edge of areole or in broad, brushy crescent and tuft, yellow to reddish, aging brown, to 10 mm. |
few, scattered, poorly developed, yellow, aging gray to blackish, to 1.5 mm, covered by white, cottony wool. |
||||||||||||||||
Flowers | inner tepals yellow to magenta throughout, 25–40 mm; filaments white, yellow, or red to magenta (flowers may superficially appear bicolored); anthers yellow; style white to pale pink; stigma lobes green. |
inner tepals brilliant yellow throughout, fading orange to red, 25–30 mm; filaments white to green; anthers yellow; style white; stigma lobes bright light green. |
||||||||||||||||
Fruits | tan to brown, ± cylindric, 15–45 × 12–25 mm, dry at maturity, glabrous, sometimes burlike; areoles 10–33, each or only distal areoles bearing 3–16 spines, 4–20 mm. |
pink- to red-purple with red pulp, pyriform, 30 × 25 mm, fleshy, glabrous, spineless; areoles 18–25, usually crowded near apex, long, white woolly. |
||||||||||||||||
Seeds | tan to gray, flattened, warped, oblong to subcircular, 3–7 × 2–4 mm; girdle protruding 1–2 mm. |
tan, subcircular, 2 mm diam.; girdle broad, projecting 0.5 mm. |
||||||||||||||||
2n | = 22. |
|||||||||||||||||
Opuntia polyacantha |
Opuntia ellisiana |
|||||||||||||||||
Phenology | Flowering spring (May–Jun). | |||||||||||||||||
Habitat | Cultivation | |||||||||||||||||
Distribution |
AZ; CA; CO; ID; KS; MT; ND; NE; NM; NV; OK; SD; TX; UT; WY; AB; SK; n Mexico
|
AZ; TX; Mexico [Introduced in North America] |
||||||||||||||||
Discussion | Varieties 5 (5 in the flora). Populations of Opuntia polyacantha with spines few or absent (especially var. hystricina) were the basis for several names including O. juniperina, O. utahensis, and O. rhodantha. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Opuntia ellisiana is only known from cultivation in the United States; the type is from a cultivated plant growing in Corpus Christi, Texas. Opuntia ellisiana has been confused with O. ficus-indica; their fruits are readily separable in the number and distribution of areoles and fruit size. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
||||||||||||||||
Key |
|
|||||||||||||||||
Source | FNA vol. 4. | FNA vol. 4. | ||||||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Cactaceae > subfam. Opuntioideae > Opuntia | Cactaceae > subfam. Opuntioideae > Opuntia | ||||||||||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Synonyms | Cactus ferox, Tunas polyacantha | O. lindheimeri var. ellisiana | ||||||||||||||||
Name authority | Haworth: Suppl. Pl. Succ., 82. (1819) | Griffiths: Rep. (Annual) Missouri Bot. Gard. 21: 170, plate 25. (1910) | ||||||||||||||||
Web links |
|