CACTUS FAMILY
Reading edition
Prickly Pear Opuntia humifusa
Plate 32, fig. 6
The Prickly Pear bears yellow flowers on low branching spiny stems. As in all the members of the cactus family, the plants are leafless, the stems having been modified into food-making and water-storing organs that take the place of foliage. The flowers bloom in midsummer on prairies and plains at 4000-7000 ft. The fruit of the Prickly Pear is sometimes used as food, being collected and sold in the markets in some localities. The juice is used for coloring confectionery, and in Mexico a drink called “Colinche” is prepared from it. The old, fibrous parts of the joints are made into commercial articles when hard and firm. Opuntia cochinellifera is extensively cultivated in Mexico for the purpose of breeding the cochineal insect from which the finest crimson dye is produced.
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Purple Cactus Cactus viviparus
Plate 32, fig. 7
The many-petalled, starry blossoms of the Purple Cactus grow in groups on ball-like fleshy stems which are but a few inches tall and covered with radiating brown and yellow spines. They dot the prairies and foothills at 3000-7000 ft. and bloom in midsummer.