Golden Cholla
Silver Cholla
Cylindropuntia echinocarpa
(Opuntia echinocarpa)
Photographed near the Imperial Dunes in southeastern California 2006.
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RANGE: A cholla of far western areas of the Sonoran Desert
into the Mojave Desert.
SPINES: Densely spiny and glistening either silver or golden
color. Old prospectors would have learned to avoid these golden silver cacti.
JOINTS: The stems are succulent and formed into cylindrical
joints mostly less than 12 cm long
and 2½ cm in diameter. The
tubercles on the joints are conspicuously raised and elongate.
FRUIT: mature fruit is dry and bears many spines. They do not
form chains.
SHRUB: Normally a single-trunked cactus, but intricately
branching above. Exceptional specimens reaching 3 meters.
FLOWERS: Numerous petals are yellow-green.