OPUNTIA. 



177 



Figure 216 is from a photograph of a plant in the collection of the New York Botanical 

 Garden grown from a cutting brought by Dr. MacDougal and Dr. Rose from Tehuacan, 

 Mexico, in 1906. 



Series 20. FICUS-INDICAE. 



Large plants, usually with large, nearly 

 spineless green joints; spines, when present, few, 

 small, white; flowers large, usually orange to yel- 

 low. None of the species is definitely known in 

 the wild state, but all doubtless originated from 

 tropical American ancestors, and they may all 

 represent spineless races of plants here included 

 in our series Streptacanthae. Some of them are 

 cultivated for their fruit and others for forage. 



KEY TO SPECIES. 



Joints obovate to elliptic, comparatively 



broad, more or less glaucous. 

 Joints dull. 



Joints thin, up to 5 dm. long. . 196. O. ficus-indica 

 Joints thick, 15 cm. long or less. 197. O. crassa 



Joints glossy 198. O. undulala 



Joints elongated, comparatively nar- 

 row. 

 Flowers yellow; joints somewhat 



tuberculate 199. 0. lanceolala 



Flowers orange-red; joints not tu- 

 berculate 200. O. maxima 



196. Opuntia ficus-indica ( Linnaeus) Miller, Card . 

 Diet. ed. 8. No. 2. 1768. 



Cactus ficus-indica Linnaeus, Sp. PI. 468. 1753 

 Cactus opuntia Gussone, Fl. Sic. Prodr. 559 



1827-8. Not Linnaeus. 

 Opuntia vulgaris Tenore, Syll. Fl. Neap. 239. 



1831. Not Miller. 



Opuntia ficits-barbarica Berger, Monatsschr. 

 Kakteenk. 22: 181. 1912. 



Large and bushy or sometimes erect and tree- FI G- 216. Opuntia pilifcra. 



like and then with a definite woody trunk up to 



5 meters high, usually with a large top; joints oblong to spatulate-oblong, usually 3 to 5 cm. long, 

 sometimes even larger; areoles small, usually spineless; glochids yellow, numerous, soon dropping 

 off; leaves subulate, green, 3 mm. long; flowers large, normally bright yellow, 7 to 10 cm. broad; 

 ovary 5 cm. long; fruit normally red, edible, 5 to 9 cm. long, with a low, depressed umbilicus. 



Type locality: Tropical America. 



Distribution: Native home not known, but now found all over the tropics and sub- 

 tropics either as cultivated plants or as escapes. It is hardy in Bermuda and Florida. 



This cactus is widely cultivated in all tropical and subtropical countries, where it is 

 grown for its fruits and for forage. It has run wild in many waste places along the Mediter- 

 ranean Sea, about the Red Sea, in southern Africa, and in Mexico. 



We have not attempted to list the many named garden varieties of this species, 

 which are sometimes Latin and sometimes English in form. 



Opuntia amydaea ficus-indica (Berger, Monatsschr. Kakteenk. 15: 154. 1905) has 

 never been described. 



The origin of this common, cultivated species doubtless dates back to prehistoric 

 times. We have long been convinced that it is a close relative of the Streptacanthae, and 

 have kept it out of that series as only a matter of convenience. Mr. A. Berger believed it 

 to be a spineless form of 0. amydaea, which is now a well-established species in certain parts 

 of Italy. Dr. Griffiths has recently figured a reversion which appeared on the common 



