I’m surprised that it doesn’t have endangered animal toppings.
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100% Canadien!
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We had some “are-you-happy-to-see-me” fungi like these over the summer (they may be upthread) – the whole life cycle seemed to be 3 days or so.
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We´ve got a weekend of heavy rain after an entire dry month. I noticed it yesterday. Maybe the weather change triggers the process.
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Never trust a central Texas winter. 2 weeks of 60 to 70 during the day and now an ice storm. Poor plants.
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Poor plants, but beautiful photos!
The first time I ever saw the southwest desert (I think I was 11yo) we drove through central TX right after a huge ice storm. It was so wild seeing all those cacti coated in an inch of ice, especially as that was the first time ever seeing anything like a cactus in the wild in person. So beautiful.
The next day at the step-aunt’s house, the ice was all gone, and I learned a very painful lesson: despite their appearance, cholla cacti are not soft and you should not play kick pass with them.
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Cacti are definitely a look-don’t-touch plantand cholla have those tiny barbs.
I’m really pleased with the pictures, the ones from yesterday didn’t turn out as well because there was too much cloud cover. The forecast says snow on Monday, second time this year. Bizzare. Not as bizzare as the predicted low of 1 degree Fahrenheit. The lowest its been around here since 1949.
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Hope you didn’t hug any Teddy Bear cholla…
The prickly pears in our back yard don’t have spines, just glochids. When my son was just starting to toddle around by himself he was playing in the back yard and stumbled into one, getting the hairs all in his arm, and there was much crying, and Daddy couldn’t get them all out (when that happens they typically take two or three years to be dissolved by the body, according to our pediatrician).
The next day he went outside, walked up to the cactus, and slapped it for its temerity. On that day (after another round of crying while Daddy went over his hand with tweezers) he became a true child of the desert.
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No hugging, but my little brother and i delighted in plucking the little pieces and kick passing them across the desert landscape…I think it wasn’t until evening bath time that the real pain started.
That is bad-ass!
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Yeah…in any event, I don’t think he’s run afoul of a cactus since: two times was a charm.
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I’m wondering if that’s the “jumping cactus” we’d invariably find the hard way while camping… Thin, straggly, and evidently spring-loaded.
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There are many kinds of cholla (staghorn, buckthorn, pencil, teddy bear, Christmas, chain-fruit, etc.), and I believe a number are referred to as “jumping” because they easily drop segments with the goal of them being spread and rerooting elsewhere.
Although if you live in the desert you know full well (and any desert botanist will agree with me) that they actually physically launch themselves up to five feet in order to impale a person, and that their motivation is purely spite.
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I don’t have a photo/video so I’ll just relay what happened. The family’s watching an on-demand TV episode and every other advertisement is for a prescription medicine.
This is the new litany I recite IRL when a pharmaceutical ad appears:
Ask your doctor about touching your own butt.
Do not touch your own butt if you’re allergic to touching your own butt.
Serious side effects may include touching your own butt.
I think I’m funnier than the kids do.
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Ask your doctor about XELJANZ, I’ve been told often
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Slowly I turned, step by step, inch by inch…
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Don’t take XELJANZ if you’re allergic to XELJANZ.
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My fave from the folks in the new drug naming biz is Wellbutrin. I’m sure the other companies were so jealous they got “well” in there, right up front.
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