Opuntia santa rita

[roddimmitt]

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I purchased this Opuntia santa rita at a nursery in CA, in Half Moon Bay. Unfortunately, I could not find any data at the time, that would show cold hardiness. This plant is good for about 25 degrees, so I can not plant it in my garden. We had 2 nights with lows of -9 degrees back in December, and we are in a plant zone that is -5 degrees (Carson City, NV). Never-the-less, I have this in a pot that I can bring in during the Winter. The plant has one new pad and 7 flowers on it and thought I would share it! My first cactus flowers of 2014!!

[hoteidoc]

Half Moon Bay -- isn't that Home for Mavericks' ? But I digress... Dave's Garden has santa-rita listed to 0F/Z7a. It's also an Op. that I'm trying to "squeak by" in my Z6b area. Just bought a pad, & have seeds that I hope to force into germination -- 1 technique or another

[A. Dean Stock]

Nice plant but it isn't Opuntia santa-rita. It is likely to be either O. macrocentra or O. azurea. Without locality data or chromosome count it is difficult to say which. I lean more towards O. azurea from what I can see of it but there are also many hybrids out there with O. macrorhiza that have long tapering fruit like yours appears to have, so it could also be a hybrid.
Dean

[hoteidoc]

Sort of had that "feeling", Dean (have "lived" on CF long enough), but figured I'd address the cold-hardiness of O. santa-rita!

[roddimmitt]

Dean: Thanks for the heads up. As I look at the samples pictured in Cactiguide, Opuntia macrocentra looks a lot closer. The nursery that I purchased this plant from got their stock from a grower in Santa Rosa, so it could be a hybrid.