Cactus Blog 

<img width="375" hspace="5" height="281" border="2" src="/blog/uploads/misc/gerardside.jpg" /><br /><br /><a href="https://cactusjungle.com/archives/blog/exit.php?url_id=1903&amp;entry_id=1741" title="http://blog.hortmag.com/PermaLink,guid,bd617f70-5302-4d47-9c2f-2078b0800c07.aspx" onmouseover="window.status=’http://blog.hortmag.com/PermaLink,guid,bd617f70-5302-4d47-9c2f-2078b0800c07.aspx’;return true;" onmouseout="window.status=”;return true;">Horticulture Magazine</a> is featuring some lithops that one of their editors is trying to keep alive.<br /><br /><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Living Stone (I Presume)<br />
by Meg Lynch<br />
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It was July 15, 2002, to be exact—I noted it in the cactus and succulent diary that I kept at the time:<br />
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“LIVING STONES!!! !!! !!! Very excited! One is greenish and the other grayish/peachish—they look good and I will take careful care of them!”<br />
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At some point soon thereafter the gray one died, though I don’t seem to have noted it.<br />
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On March 1, 2003, I mention that lately the still-living living stone, the green one, which I dubbed Gerard, “started to open a pinhole and that turned into a large oval-shaped separation and inside there are what look like tiny Gerards.” I had been hoping it was going to flower. But it was just going through the routine of a living stone: to shed its leaves each year, revealing new leaves inside.</span><br /></div><br />Now that’s what I call garden writing, container-garden-style.<br /><br />

They take most of their garden plants straight from the wild, and nature is suffering. Can Mexico encourage people to grow and buy plants at nurseries? The <a href="https://cactusjungle.com/archives/blog/exit.php?url_id=1901&amp;entry_id=1738" title="http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/world/02/24/0224mexicocactus.html" onmouseover="window.status=’http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/world/02/24/0224mexicocactus.html’;return true;" onmouseout="window.status=”;return true;">Austin American Statesman</a> asks the question.<br /><br /><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><br /><img width="400" hspace="5" border="2" src="/blog/uploads/misc/image_6677021.jpg" /></div><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Nancy Flores/COX NEWSPAPERS<br />
Golden barrel cacti are rare in the wild but common in nurseries, including this regional botanical garden in Queretaro….<br />
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More than a third of the country’s species are considered at risk of disappearing….<br />
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Some experts are trying to encourage Mexicans to build nurseries to grow tame cacti instead of pulling wild ones out of the ground. Emiliano Sanchez Martinez, director of a botanical garden in the Queretaro desert, supervises a youth-run greenhouse in the small town of El Arbolito.</span><br /></div><br />

They keep their aloes in pots in <a href="https://cactusjungle.com/archives/blog/exit.php?url_id=1899&amp;entry_id=1735" title="http://www.seacoastonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080226/LIFE/802260310" onmouseover="window.status=’http://www.seacoastonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080226/LIFE/802260310′;return true;" onmouseout="window.status=”;return true;">New Hampshire</a>. I think that’s probably a good idea.<br /><br /><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-style: italic;">When we have an aloe plant within reach of our kitchen stove, we have a burn unit ready to go to work.</span><br /></div><br />I think this means they’re planning on pulling leaves off that plant if they get a burn. PULLING OFF LEAVES! Ouch. I wonder if they then rub some of that healing aloe juice on the aloe plant’s wounds? I would, but then I’m sensitive that way.<br /><br />

So it turns out that elections matter. Here we have the results of the recent Republican monopoly in Texas. <a href="https://cactusjungle.com/archives/blog/exit.php?url_id=1898&amp;entry_id=1733" title="http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/02/24/0224texascactus.html" onmouseover="window.status=’http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/02/24/0224texascactus.html’;return true;" onmouseout="window.status=”;return true;">The Austin Statesman</a> has a story to tell:<br /><br /><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Texas regulations against cactus poaching and enforcement are lax compared with oversight in Arizona, which requires legally harvested wild cacti to be tagged, according to state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso….<br />
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&quot;I’ve been on properties where you see mostly holes where plants were dug up,&quot; said Terry Martin, a professor of botany at Sul Ross State University…. Shapleigh has authored legislation that would require individuals who harvest or sell plants to provide proof that the plants come from their own land or that they have written permission from the property owner where the harvesting took place.<br />
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In 2003, Gov. Rick Perry vetoed the legislation…<br />
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In 2007, a similar piece of Shapleigh cactus legislation died in a House committee.<br />
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State Rep. Sid Miller, R-Stephenville, said he didn’t give Shapleigh’s bill a hearing in his Agriculture and Livestock Committee because &quot;it seemed like everything he was worried about we already had rules to address.&quot;</span><br /></div><br />Thank you for your consideration.<br /><br />

BioSerae is a french company that uses <a href="https://cactusjungle.com/archives/blog/exit.php?url_id=1896&amp;entry_id=1731" title="http://www.nutraingredients.com/news/ng.asp?n=83495-bioserae-cactus-antioxidants-weight-management" onmouseover="window.status=’http://www.nutraingredients.com/news/ng.asp?n=83495-bioserae-cactus-antioxidants-weight-management’;return true;" onmouseout="window.status=”;return true;">cactus ingredients in supplements</a>. They process prickly pear pads with the idea that they’re supposed to &quot;combat metabolic syndrome, manage weight and boost antioxidant levels.&quot; And now they’re making the cactus products tastier by using the fruit. <br /><br /><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-style: italic;">&quot;An in vivo study on rats showed that, after only seven days of treatment, Cacti-Nea helps to strengthen the antioxidant protection of the body by increasing the globular rate of glutathione peroxidase (antioxidant marker).&quot; </span><br /></div><br />You know what I think of the Saturday morning cartoons these days? I hate them. There’s nothing good on anymore. Ever since they canceled Pinky and the Brain, it’s been all downhill. Sure, Adult Swim has been good after midnight, but I want to wake up early on a Saturday and watch some quality brightly colored cartoons and I’m very disappointed.<br /><br />

Ever wonder which cactus in the Arizona desert you could eat, if perchance you were lost in the Arizona desert with water but no food and were getting hungry? Well there’s a class you can take that will tell you everything you need to know. I suspect they’ll let you know that prickly pears taste good, especially the delicious, delicious fruit. <a href="https://cactusjungle.com/archives/blog/exit.php?url_id=1893&amp;entry_id=1729" title="http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/109658" onmouseover="window.status=’http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/109658′;return true;" onmouseout="window.status=”;return true;">Lets find out.</a><br style="font-style: italic;" /><div style="margin-left: 40px;"><br style="font-style: italic;" /><img width="300" hspace="5" height="200" border="2" src="/blog/uploads/misc/fcstvwpm.jpg" /><br style="font-style: italic;" /><span style="font-style: italic;">Laura Segall, For the Tribune LISTEN AND LEARN: Janet Pribbenow and Bob Gottschalk, both of Waterloo, Wis., listen as Don Wells of Apache Junction leads a tour about edible and medicinal desert plants at Boyce Thompson Arboretum.<br />
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What: Learn about desert plants you can eat<br />
When: 1:30 p.m. on March 8 and March 23<br />
Where: Boyce Thompson Arboretum, U.S. 60, near Superior<br />
Cost: $7.50 adults, $3 ages 5 to 12 and free for children under 5; hike is free<br />
Information: (520) 689-2723 or ag.arizona.edu/bta<br />
</span><br /></div><br />There you go.<br /><br />