WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

Thorny clumps of sprawling to erect pads reach 1–3-feet high and wide. Each oval to circular, 4–13-inch long pad is lined with rows of areoles with rigid white to dark-brown spines. Note the petals of the showy yellow flowers usually have a reddish base. Cold weather can cause the pads to droop to the ground and sometimes turn reddish, but no wrinkling occurs. This is the most common and widespread large-scale prickly pear in NM.

SPINES: 5–7 areoles diagonally across mid-stem on the upper 3/4 to 1/2 surface of the pad surface; each areole has 2–8 spines, 1 1/4–3 1/8-inches (3–8 cm) long, flattened, spreading to downward pointing. Fewer, shorter spines on lower areoles; occasionally pads are nearly spineless. Tufts of barbed, hair-like, barbed glochid bristles surround the areoles and cause painful irritation if touched.

FLOWER: April–June. Showy, yellow 2–3 1/2-inch wide (5–9 cm) flowers have numerous petal-like tepals with red-tinted bases (occasionally solid yellow); filaments and anthers yellow, stigma with green to yellowish-green lobes. Fruit fleshy, red, barrel-shaped, 1–2-inches (25–50 mm) tall, have areoles without spines, but still armed with barbed glochids.

HABITAT: 3,400–8,800 feet.

ELEVATION: Dry rocky, sandy soils; desert scrub and grasslands, pinyon-juniper woodlands.

RANGE: AZ, CA, CO, KS, NV, NM, OK, SD, TX, UT.

SIMILAR SPECIES: Long-spine Purple Prickly Pear, O. macrocentra, has 4–8-inch (10-20 cm) round to oval pads that turn red when stressed, brown to black spines to 5 inches (12 cm) long especially along the apex, and yellow flowers with red centers. Plains Prickly Pear, O. microrhiza, statewide, also with yellow flowers with red centers , forms chains one pad high, and has wrinkled older pads with few white spines.

NM COUNTIES: Statewide in low- to mid-elevation, arid habitats.