Prickly Pear

Description:

The branches (cladodes) are flattened, green to grey. The branches are 30-60 cm long and 6-15 cm wide. Its younger branches arch upwards. The leaves are modified into spines. The flowers are conspicuous, bright yellow or orange, red in color. It bears succulent berries which are reddish when ripe, pyriform, depressed at the apex, about 8 cm long and covered with clusters of small, hairlike prickles called glochids, that easily penetrate skin and detach from the plant. This is a succulent shrub ranging 1.5-3 m. It develops a sturdy trunk with age.

Habitat:

Countryside

Notes:

Like all true cactus species, prickly pears are native only to the Americas, but they have been introduced to other parts of the globe. There are over 200 species of prickly pear cactuses. Opuntia is cultivated as an ornamental or as live hedge. It can be used as a medicinal plant. Most culinary uses of the term "prickly pear" refer to this species. Prickly pears are also known as tuna (fruit) or nopal (paddle, plural nopales) from the Nahuatl word nōpalli for the pads, or nostle, from the Nahuatl word nōchtli for the fruit; or paddle cactus.