National Geographic Magazine/Volume 31/Number 6/Our State Flowers/The Sahuaro

Our State Flowers

The Sahuaro (Carnegiea gigantea [formerly known as Cereus giganteus] (Engelm.) Britton and Rose)

Arizona

SAHUARO or GIANT CACTUS
Carnegiea gigantea (Engelm.) Britton & Rose

When the legislature of Arizona selected the column cactus, known to laymen as the sahuaro, as the State flower, it chose a representative which for tenacity and ability to live under stressful conditions is unsurpassed. The sahuaro grows so as sometimes to resemble an upstanding Brobdingnagian cucumber and at others to look like a huge green candelabra. It thrives on the mountain slopes where other plants cannot survive the shortage of moisture, rearing its thick, cylindrical branches straight up into the air as high as 40 feet. These are armed with rows of spines arranged in star shapes, and in May and June bear exquisite whitish, waxlike flowers, perfect in form and opening in the daytime.

We always think it wise to save for a “rainy” day; but paradoxical as it may sound, the “rainy” day of the cactus is the day when it fails to rain for a long time. So it has arranged its household economy for “making hay” while the rain falls. In wet weather it converts itself into a sort of green-hued sponge, drinking up great stores of water. It long ago suppressed the last vestige of a leaf, and in lieu thereof has covered itself with a thick, hard, impervious coating which sometimes has a grayish bloom on the surface. In other species the coating is covered by a mass of thick hairs. In this way it is able to prevent evaporation of its moisture under the fiercest sun and calmly to await new supplies. It is indeed the vegetable counterpart of the camel.

We think of the cacti as unfriendly, yet the birds often find them a refuge. Woodpeckers make holes in the sahuaro for their nesting places. Other small birds of the arid regions move in when the woodpeckers move out. One of these is a small owl, said to be the tiniest of all members of the owl tribe. Another feathered friend of the cacti is the cactus wren, a little songster with a grayish brown back, a darker head, a spotted breast, and a white line over the eye. It builds a large, flask-shaped nest of grasses and twigs which it lines with feathers. The nest is entered by a covered way or neck several inches long.

The column cactus, like most of its relatives, is a prolific producer of seeds. Millions reach the ground, thousands may germinate, but only now and then does one escape the perils of childhood and become a full-grown cactus. In their youthful days the sahuaros are odd, round plants only a few inches high and with the spines, which protect them from animal depredations, undeveloped. The fruits of this species have a crimson flesh and black seeds, reminding one in those respects of the Georgia watermelon. The Papago Indians eat both the meat and the seeds.

Source: —, ed. (June 1917), “Our State Flowers: The Floral Emblems Chosen by the Commonwealths”, The National Geographic Magazine 31(6): 498. (Illustration from page 513.)