I’ve been watching my Hedgehog Cactus developing big fat flower buds and looking forward to multiple blooms. Javelina nipped that in the bud. Ha! pun 🙂 They came through and chomped off almost every bud! Oh well…..that’s the price of wanting to enjoy wildlife.
So far they haven’t touched my two Claret Cups. Maybe they only like local native food 🙂
Tag Archives: hedgehog cactus
road trip….day two
The Guest House Inn in Ajo turned out to be our favorite lodging of the week. We highly recommend it.
Historic and charming but it was breakfast that we’ll never forget! Mike is an excellent cook.
On the way out of town, we stop for a daytime shot of the Ajo Mission. I shot in infrared.
Next stop is Organ Pipe National Monument. We find that over one third has been closed down because of border crossing issues. We decide to drive the Ajo Mountain Loop and stop for a short hike. Along the way, we spot several Strawberry Hedgehog Cactus in bloom.
The most spectacular organ pipe cactus are closer to the border, unfortunately, so we didn’t see many.
Here’s a couple of infrared shots from a trail. That’s me in the second image (self timer).
Echinocereus engelmannii
Echinocereus engelmannii….rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it?! And yet, I can remember this one because it has the most striking flowers of all the cactus, I think. Many are near fuchsia, a color which Wikipedia describes as Electric Magenta. This is especially fitting when they’re backlit.
