More Side Trips with Pictures on the Way Home

I am looking forward to yucas fritas tomorrow at Sanbusco with no parking fees! Yippee! Roybird and I are going to have some fun and good eating.
Never tangle with a cactus. The cacti usually win unless you use a bulldozer which isn't fair and wouldn't fit in your back yard anyhow.

Last summer I was working in the Spring Mountains where there are native yuccas with leaves like knives. We were scrambling down this rocky canyon to reach a spring and I slipped and slid into one of them. I ended up with about 4 deep puncture wounds from that encounter and the first aid kit was back at the top of the canyon in the car so I just kept working. I was glad the pants I was wearing were old and full of holes anyway. Between the yucca, cacti, and everything else with thorns out there I felt like a pincushion by the time we finished. Not a place I would recommend for a nice relaxing hike.

The yuccas in my yard have nice flexible tips of the leaves so they're not so painful.

Your picture of the clouds is a very good one roybird.

Thank you.

Great photos. Have to admit that I'm not much of a catci fan. Joshua trees, however, are really neat.

I like many of the cacti. Just don't want them in my yard.

I don't think most of them would look good in my current landscape, but I could use a clump of claret cup cacti.

I promised above to post a pic of our huge saguaro(s) that we had in AZ ... here they are with monsoon storm clouds hovering...

p

Oh, I love it! That's a nice picture!

I want those in my AZ/NM garden. How long before they get that tall? Probably pretty pricey to buy them that big?

It takes a hundred years for the first arm to grow, they say. Big ones like in that picture are hundreds of years old. This explains why I recommend that you find a home with big saguaros in place, if possible. I don't know what it costs to buy them, and you cannot "dig them up" without a special permit. And then, transporting requires a huge truck, a lumber "scaffolding" to keep it from breaking, and lordy, what about those spikes? Sadly, they can blow over in extreme weather (rare, but it can happen), and of course the older ones are more vulnerable. You can buy them though, in North Scottsdale there is often a truck parked with a saguaro to sell on Scottsdale Rd. north of Frank Lloyd Wright Blvd., and nurseries often sell them, but they are verrrrrry expensive.

Crappola that's what I was afraid of. I think the cactii are going to be the most expensive part of that garden and initially I thought that would be the cheapest as they are natives LOL.

DN, when you are ready to find a place in AZ, whether renting or buying, contact me privately and I will help you. I still hold my AZ real estate Broker license and I'm a real estate instructor... I will help you find the right agent and the right house, okay? We'll find you one with the cacti already there! (I'm not trying to promote myself here, just offer direction with the right people to help, hope that's okay...)

Brenda

O that would be so fabby to have help!!! We are looking in the south between Tucson and Las Cruces NM. We cancelled our trip this winter do to the luly $.70 CA$ and are now planning to go down in November. I'll keep you posted.

Aren't they the Aunts and Uncles? Of the desert? Just watching over everyone?

Saguaro, I mean. Gorgeous photo, Brenda! thank you......

I went to a greenhouse in Tucson that grew all types of cactus including saguaro. They had some that weren't too expensive, but they were smallsh, but not as small as i would have thought for the price. They seemed to have the temperature, water, light etc all figured out to make them grow faster than usual -- not terribly fast, though. They also had a bunch of them, maybe 3 or 4 ft. long lying on their sides like cord wood. I guess cactus roots can be exposed to the sun for a good while without harm.
It was fascinating. You could plant a small one and watch it grow, kind of like I have done with my fruit trees. Its very satisfying after a while. At first it seems they aren't growing. Then you compare one picture to one a couple of years previously and wow! It can be exciting if you are patient.

Yes, I forgot to say Brenda, how lovely I thought your photo was. Beautiful saguaros with birds nests in them, magnificent purple clouds behind and flowers and a water feature on the ground beneath. Gorgeous. This is what makes people come to the west.

Thanks, all. Beauty is everywhere, I can't wait to have pics of our gardens here, you all will get to see before and now pics (there is really never an 'after' pic of a garden, is there... it is always a work in progress). Cacti grow amazingly slowly, btw...

They do grow slowly, but measurably.

And fabbily prettiful. I can wait. I have to make choices that will withstand desert conditions in the summer when I won't be there to water so cacti are my friends ^_^

And that is the beauty of landscaping with native plants. There are so many lovely ones and they really don't want any care other than not being run over by a truck.

Exactamondo Paj! I have a wonderfully long list from you and Roybird and Dave-who-is-Dave and HUGE help from the SW forum. I'm going 100% native. ps. Trucks will not be allowed in my garden.

Good move, dahlia.

If you can you MUST see the Desert Botanic Garden in Phoenix. Here are some of my pictures from our visit over Spring Break.
http://www2.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=347725013/a=108276766_108276766/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish

Beautiful photos, lisabees! As it turns out, I will probably be going to Phoenix for a week with my DH and his mother while she visits the Mayo Clinic for tests. I knew about the Dale C. show and hope to at least get to see that, if not take the family. Now I am really inspired to make time for it

The Desert Botanical Gardens have been around for a long time if it is the place I'm thinking of. Edge of Phoenix near Tempe, near the zoo?

Oh you should, Paja! There is a Chihuly show indoors there as well but that is extra, and there is SO much art out in the gardens. As if the gardens themselves weren't enough (and they are actually) :0).

We cross-posted Roybird. Yes it's in Papago Park, the zoo is there too.

My old home ground! My brothers and I almost lived at the zoo. When some adult threatened to send us to live there permanently, probably in the monkey house, we were ecstatic! The Botanical Gardens bored us; I'm sorry to say. There used to be a golf course out there, too, where my mother wandered around. Takes me back to my mis-spent youth. I think my mother was one of the first supporters of the zoo and so we had a membership and she would just drop us off to be raised by the javelinas!

That explains a lot roybird! Actually the zoo animals generally are good parents, so your mother knew what she was doing. For me going to the zoo was a once-every-couple of years experience.
BTW, how are you and DH feeling. I am still fine.
I really want to see the Chihuly show, but who knows if there will be time with my MIL's tests and other needs. I have my fingers crossed -- and of course I am a sucker for Botanical Gardens anywhere.

"raised by javelinas" - hilarious!

"Raised by Javelinas" explains the wild look in her eyes for sure!

That's what I was thinking.

tee hee