FLORA OF THE VALLEY

CACTUS

The prickly pear, an extremely spiny plant with fleshy, flattened joints, is a Southern California native that grows in abundance in the Santa Monica Mountains.

A member of the cactus family, the prickly pear, Opuntia , is an erect plant that spreads to form large masses. The plants often reach five feet tall.

Its spines, which grow in clusters, are white with a reddish-brown base and measure between 5/8 inch and 1 3/8 inches long. They have small, barbed hairs around their bases.

Yellow, showy flowers, 2 to 3 inches in diameter with small, waxy petals, bloom on joints from the upper part of the prickly pear’s stem in May and June. The spines and flowers grow from specialized points called areolae, which are small hollows.

The plant bears pear-shape fruit, 2 to 2 1/2 inches long and red to reddish purple in color. The fruit grows on the large end of this cactus and has a flat scar where the flower was attached. Small, tapering, awl-shape leaves appear on joints grown during the previous year. Its leaves fall off in two to three months.

Prickly pears can be found near the coast in dry washes and inland at lower elevations.

Pictured here are coast prickly pears, Opuntia littoralis , growing about 200 feet along Mulholland Highway, about a mile west of Malibu Canyon Road in the Santa Monica Mountains. They are one of four species of the 2,000-member cactus family that are native to local mountains.