JOURNAL 
OF 
The New York Botanical Garden 
— 
VoL. XX February, 1919 No. 230 
THE PRICKLY PEARS OF FLORIDA 
(WITH PLATES 224, 225, 226) 
Succulent plants grow in most parts of the world; but America 
can justly claim the most peculiar group of succulents, as well as 
one with almost endless variety in form. 
Since the discovery of America, the cacti have been of general 
or particular interest to all who have come into contact with them. 
The early adventurers in the New World, and the explorers, 
were quick to make the acquaintance of these plants, as is evi- 
denced by the prompt introduction and naturalization of several 
kinds of prickly-pears in southern Europe, northern Africa, and 
western Asia. Later others became naturalized in southern 
Africa, in the East Indies, and in, Australia. 
The history of the genus Opuntia in Florida is quite simple. 
Reference to this group of plants doubtless exists in the records 
of the early Spanish expeditioners; but the botanical history 
apparently dates from the publication of Bartram’s ‘Travels’! 
in which William Bartram gives an account of a large prickly- 
pear then native in the wilderness lying west of Lake George in 
the peninsula. This locality was recently visited by the writer, 
Who thus made the first botanical pilgrimage to that still unin- 
habited region since the Bartrams were there nearly a century 
and a half ago, 
During the last century, as far as well-known descriptive 
' Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, 
Tor. 
21 
hood 
