Saguaro Cactus

Since I was five years old I have thought that the Saguaro cactus was the coolest plant on the planet.  Doesn't he look like someone waving good-bye?  or a teddy-bear-kinda-something waving?

Though it is totally unique to the American Southwest, how one should pronounce the word, Saguaro, is not unique:  sa·gua·ro (s -gwär , -wär ) also sa·hua·ro (s -wär ). n. pl. sa·gua·ros also sa·hua·ros.  And none of those seems to be the way I say it:  su-wa-ro.  If you want to speak it, pick any and give it a try.  If it doesn't "work" for you, try another!

These guys are amazing.  After growing for 30 years, they begin to flower at the top of its "head" at night only, for about four weeks in late April into May.  (Saguaro don't begin to grow "arms" until its 75 years old.  Then it will flower at the tip of the arms, too.)  There is a cluster of large, really pretty, creamy-white flowers that only last until the next afternoon.  The flowering continues until each cactus has produced about a hundred blossoms.  Those blossoms are cross-pollinated with the help of white-winged dove, long-nosed bats, honey bees and moths.  Then a fruit (fruit? in the desert?) is produced by June or July which Native Americans used to make jam and syrup and even wine for their religious ceremonies.  It was so important to the Tohono O'odham Indians that they would use the ripening of the fruit to mark the beginning of their new year.

The seeds from the fruit survived best if they found themselves dropped under some of the other desert plants because those plants would shade them from the excessive desert heat and shelter them from "predators" like coyotes and javelina (not a wild pig like most folks think, but a hoofed mammal about the size of a small coyote.)  

My avocado tree!

If a seed managed to take root it would grow about 1/4 of an inch in the first year.  After fifteen years that lil' feller would be about 12" tall!  Woo-hoo!  (I planted an avocado seed that sprouted a couple of weeks ago.  It's already 20" tall.  I have no clue how I'm gonna get that puppy home to Texas, but Granpa says it's goin' no matter what.)  If the Saguaro only grows 1/4" a year, we are talkin' slo-o-o-w growin' on the Saguaro!

The Saguaro does live to be about 150 years old though - if the lightening doesn't get it before that.  It's the tallest thing in the desert, so it is a lightening rod!  The desert birds like to drill holes in the cactus to nest in.  Two species, the Gila woodpecker and the gilded flicker, may drill several holes before settling down into one to lay their eggs  - but that's okay, because there is always a bunch of other species that are delighted to move into the unoccupied spaces!  The Saguaro's structure makes those nests 20 degrees cooler than the outside temperature in the summertime!  

American kestrel, Lucy's warblers, cactus wrens, western kingbirds, phainopeplas, elf owls screech owls, purple martins and honeybees make their nests in those spare holes, but red-tailed hawks and Harris hawks build their big ol' nests in the crook of the Saguaro's arms.  (That's a lot of critters roaming around the desert!!)

Nighttime not only brings out the flowers, but that's when the animals come out, too.  If you visit during the day you'll think, "How devoid of life the desert is - let's go home."  Not so.  What you need to do is spend the night!  The critters are just smarter than you and I, and they sleep through the heat of the day!  At night in the desert the cactus mouse goes a-stirring, along with the Western diamondback rattlesnake, Gambel's quail, roadrunners (two of my favorite birds of all time), desert tortoise's and Gila monsters.  During the day you might see a jackrabbit because it's huge ears act as air conditioners and release body heat so that it doesn't have a heat stroke.  Or maybe you'll see a kangaroo rat because it NEVER needs to drink water, ever!  It gets all its moisture from eating seeds.

The cacti (plural form of cactus) have spines instead of leaves so they don't loose much water to evaporative cooling, but the Saguaro goes a couple of steps further:  it has a waxy outer coating that traps the moisture inside and the sides of the cactus are accordion-like pleats which easily expand to store water as does the sponge-like meat of the cactus.  That meat combines with the water to form a gelatin-like substance that makes evaporation a really slow process, too.  

The Saguaro's root system is very shallow, but spreads all around to a distance equal to the height of the plant it feeds.  When it rains - and it usually rains less than 12" a year - the Saguaro can soak up as much as 200 gallons of water!  (Texas usually gets about 42" a year, Atlanta gets about 50" a year.)

So after 150 years, the Saguaro can get as tall as 50 feet and weigh up to 16,000 pounds or more!!!  A strong but surprisingly flexible cylinder-shaped frame of long woody ribs at the center manages to support that monster.  All in all, I'd say the Saguaro cactus is about as creative a plant as there is anywhere!