There have only been a few barrel cacti in my study area off Hayfield Road. I only got a few photos of flowers in bloom and only saw a few fruits that resulted from flowers. I was able to extract one fruit from a cactus using tongs and was surprised to find it had no spines on it. Little hard black bb-like seeds fell out the bottom. When I got it home and cut it open, it was empty in the center.
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| The flowers are on top and are yellow. Buds are to the left and are yellow and red. A partially opened flower is bottom left. |
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| The flowers are really quite beautiful. |
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| The fruit grows when the flower dies. On the barrel cactus, the dead flower adorns the top of the fruit. The fruit have no spines because they are so well protected by the spines of the cactus. |
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| The bb-like seeds fell out of the hole in the bottom of the fruit. Unfortunately, the fruit is not edible like the hedgehog or some of the cholla fruits. |
The fruit looks like tiny pineapples. I love the red spines. This is one of the more colorful cacti.
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