Friends Day

#friendsday by Hive account@shasta

Tag a friend with what you
know they like!
Any day, everyday.

My #friendsday post is for Hive account@erikah because she requested more cactus photos!

The saguaro is the largest cactus in the United States.
The are very slow growing. A 10 year old plant might only be 1.5 inches tall.
It begins to grow arms only after it is about 15 feet tall and around 75 years old. With the right growing conditions, it is estimated that saguaros can live to be as much as 150-200 years old and can be over 40 feet tall.

Saguaro is a Native American word. The correct pronunciation is "sah-wah-ro". The formal name is Carnegiea gigantea, named for Andrew Carnegie.

The saguaro is found only in the Sonoran Desert, in California and Arizona, most of Baja California and half of the state of Sonora, Mexico. Since they can't handle frost, you won't find saguaros above an elevation of about 3,500 feet.

Poachers are the biggest threat to saguaros--they are sold as expensive lawn adornments on the black market for a few thousand dollars.

The saguaro blossom is the Arizona state flower. I do not have any pictures and have never seen one bloom, so I'm including this National Park Service photo of the blossoms.

NPS photo