Cactus

[Carl_Constantine]

If some of you remember, on the other side of my office is a coffee shop called "Beans and Greens" and the sell various plants. They even have some cactus. So, in an effort to impress Cactuspic, I tried to capture a few images. Here is one cactus:



Now, this isn't a particularly spetacular image, however, did you notice that top left corner of the cactus? If not, let me blow it up for you:



Momma has babies!

Canon 300D | 18-55mm@55 (+4+2+1) | ISO 200 | F22 | 1/200s | handheld | Flash with Diffuser (The diffuser really made a difference in the light as opposed to straight on flash BTW)

Minor Edit: to URL for cactuspic's profile.

[beetleman]

Looks like something has been eating on the cactus. I think you can eat this type of cactus and I think they have a great fruit (?) called a prickly pear, as long as they scrub the little spines off them first. I remember touching one of these and having very fine spines in my fingers for days afterwards

[MacroLuv]

Nice details Carl.
Opuntia species I guess.
But I'm not sure if this kind of growth is desirable among cacti breeders. It could be a sign of not proper enviroment conditions during the rest period.

[cactuspic]

Thank you Carl. I'm glad you tooks a few pictures of new gorwth from the injured area of that Opuntia. I'm always glad to see the overcomeing of injury The images show good detail.

Doug is 200% right In addition to the obvous large spines, oputias have glochids, in which they store and quickly release a myriad of tiny, nasty spines that always break off under the skin. All you have to do is innocently brusth by and you are attacked.

Best regards,

Irwin

[Carl_Constantine]

Thanks everyone for the comments. Those scars are actually from Cuttings taken from the plant to clone it ;-)