Photo: Stan Shebs — CC BY-SA 3.0 · source
Survives zone 2 through 8
Harvest calendar
Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.
Prickly-pear fruit sweet and seedy; young pads as a vegetable. ⚠ Glochids.
- Hardiness
- Zone 2–8
- Habit
- Groundcover
- Edible part
- Seed, Fruit
- Ripens
- Late summer–autumn
- Mature size
- Very low mat 5–15 cm tall, spreading to about 50 cm; excellent in containers
- Light
- Full sun (open-ground desert/glade)
- Soil pH
- 6.5–8.0 (neutral–alkaline, sharp drainage)
- Environment
- Temperate
- Native range
- The widest range of any North American cactus — British Columbia and the Canadian prairies south through the Great Plains to Texas and Arizona, reaching further north than any other cactus in the Americas.
- Status
- Wild
- Years to fruit
- 2–3 yrs
- Growth speed
- Slow
- Spacing
- 60 cm (24 in) apart — about 2.8 per m² (2.6 per 10 sq ft)
- Leaf shape
- No true leaves to speak of. What look like leaves are flattened stem segments (pads, or cladodes) doing the photosynthesis; the real leaves are small conical scales on new pads that shrivel and drop within weeks. Spines and glochids are borne in the areoles, which are modified buds.
- Root system
- Shallow and fibrous, with most of the root mass in the top 15 cm and spreading as far as 2.5 m from the plant within two seasons — a mat built to catch light rain before it evaporates rather than to reach deep water. It needs no soil depth, but it does need sharp drainage: standing wet in winter kills far more plants than cold does.
- Fruit description
- Small dry, spiny, tan fruit 1–2 cm long, and rarely produced — this species reproduces mostly by its pads breaking off. Not a fruit crop in any practical sense; the plant is grown for extreme hardiness rather than for eating.
- Propagation
- Easier than any other cactus here, and it does it to itself: the pads are attached so weakly that they detach at a touch — the name fragilis — and root where they fall. Pick one up on a boot and you have propagated it. Callus a detached pad for a few days and set it on gritty soil.
- Pollination
- Self-fertile
The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.
Growing guide
Fertilizing. Needs little to no supplemental feeding in lean, unamended soil; if fed at all, use a sparing, low-nitrogen application during the growing season only — excess nitrogen produces soft tissue that is more prone to winter dieback in an otherwise extremely cold-hardy cactus.
How it spreads. Spreads clonally and readily: pads detach at the slightest touch (even wind, rain, or animal contact) and root wherever they land, gradually building sprawling mats or colonies; this trait has made it a listed noxious weed in Nebraska, so give it room or contain it.
Growing tips. Pads and fruit carry sharp spines and nearly invisible glochids that embed in skin, so handle with thick gloves or tongs, especially when transplanting. It needs open, sunny, barren-to-rocky ground and is best kept away from taller or denser plants that can crowd it out; it is among the most cold-hardy cacti in North America.
Grow journal
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