With 1/2-inch diameter stems (smaller than Cane Cholla and larger that Pencil Cholla), this intricately branching 2–7-foot tall shrub creates a thorny thicket. The stem segments reach 8-inches long and are lined with tubercles. Note the pinkish-bronze flowers and reddish-green fruit with tubercles. Avoid touching the stem and fruit which have tufts of wicked hair-like, barbed glochid bristles.

FLOWER: May–June. Flowers 1–inch wide (25 mm) with greenish-bronze, reddish, to lavender petal-like tepals, cream stigma lobes, green to bronze filaments, yellow anthers; fruit egg-shaped, green maturing reddish, with tubercles and spineless, but with tufts of hair-like bristles.

SPINES: Areoles have 1–4 spines, 3/8–1 1/8-inches long (10–28 mm), yellow to gray, yellow-tipped, straight to slightly arched and often downward pointing, with a sheath covering easily slipped off; the tufts of tiny, hair-like glochid barbs can painfully work into bare skin.

HABITAT: Dry rocky, limestone, sandy soils; desert grasslands, creosote bush-mesquite scrub lands, juniper-oak woodlands.

ELEVATION: 2,600–6,000 feet.

RANGE: NM, OK, TX.

SIMILAR SPECIES: Pencil Cholla, C. leptocaulis, in the southern half of NM, has pencil-sized joints, 3/16 inch diameter (5 mm) with 1 central spine, and showy, red fruit. The nearly statewide Cane Cholla, C. imbricata, has larger stems, 3/4–1 1/4-inch diameter, magenta flowers, and yellow fruit.

NM COUNTIES: Southern and eastern NM in low- to mid-elevation, arid habitats: Bernalillo, Chaves, Dona, Ana, Eddy, Grant, Guadalupe, Hidalgo, Lincoln, Luna, Otero, Quay, San Miguel, Socorro.