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Hi...

I saw a quite large upright Opuntia about 40 miles north of the Virgin River canyon. Large pads, stacking up about 3-4 feet high, dark yellow/orange center flowers.
Is this englemanii, or something else?

thanks...

Ed J
the CACTOMAN

My guess would be chlorotica? Or maybe a cultivar.

peterb

Don't think chlorotica...pads elongated, and no trunk, growing along the ground and growing upward from the ground about 4-5 pads high.
Was growing on the edge of a rangeland off of I-15 in the hills between St George and Cedar City, nowhere near any signs of buildings.
Took a pad and rooted it, will try and get a picture

I checked on SEInet and saw no herbarium records for engelmannii in Utah. But then I investigated a few individual records, some of which were called Opuntia phaeacantha var. discata, which was Benson's name for engelmannii. There's also a few from that general area that have been determined to be engelmannii X phaeacantha, according to Wendy Hodgson. http://swbiodiversity.org/imglib/seinet ... 058999.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

peterb

general map: http://swbiodiversity.org/seinet/map/go ... e=occquery#" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That collection is EXACTLY it...was Exit 30 (Browse UT) on I-15, plant as described on the Herbarium sheet
Thanks so much...

Ed J
the CACTOMAN

You're welcome! I get a lot of mileage out of SEInet, as flawed as it still is at times due to a tangled history of names.

peterb

Large Opuntia plants in the area you describe are hybrids between O. engelmannii and O. phaeacantha (as suggested by Wendy Hodgson). These are hexaploids and in some areas the O. engelmannii genes are very apparent and dominate. The population you refer to is on the southeast slopes of the Pine Valley Mtns. Similar plants occur through out the Virgin River drainage from Zion to St. George and continues up the Santa Clara River and across to the north end of the Beaver Dam Mtns. They occur with O. chlorotica in Zion, the southeast flanks of the Pine Valley Mtns and north of St. George.

Dean

The small pad cutting I snitched has made it all the way through our infamously wet winter here near Seattle...think it's a keeper

Made 3 LARGE new pads and 3 flowers last summer too...