Opuntiacommonly called the prickly pear cactusis a genus of flowering plants in the cactus family Cactaceae, many known for their flavorful fruit and showy flowers. The genus is named for the Ancient Greek city of Opuswhere, according to Theophrastusan edible plant grew and could be propagated by rooting its leaves.
The flowers are typically large, axillary, solitary, bisexual, and epiperigynous, with a perianth consisting of distinct, spirally arranged tepals and a hypanthium. The stamens are numerous and in spiral or whorled clusters, and the gynoecium has numerous inferior ovaries per carpel.
Placentation is parietal, and the fruit is a berry with arillate seeds. Prickly pear species can vary greatly in habit; most are shrubs, but some, such as O. Opuntia contains a range of phytochemicals in variable quantities, such as polyphenolsdietary minerals and betalains.
When Carl Linnaeus published Species Plantarum in — the starting point for modern botanical nomenclature — he placed all the species of cactus known to him in one genus, Cactus. Inthe Scottish botanist Philip Miller divided them into several genera, including Opuntia.
He distinguished the genus largely on the form of its flowers and fruits. Considerable variation of taxonomy occurs within Opuntia species, resulting in names being created for variants or subtypes within a species, and use of DNA sequencing to define and isolate various species.
Opuntia hybridizes readily between species. Species accepted by Plants of the World Onlineas of October [update]are listed below, together with some species accepted by other sources, where the name preferred by Plants Mat och Bakning the World Online is also given.
Chollas, now recognized to belong to the distinct genus Cylindropuntiaare distinguished by having cylindrical, rather than flattened, stem segments with large barbed spines. The stem joints of several species, notably the jumping cholla C.
The barbed spines can remain embedded in the skin, causing discomfort and sometimes injury. One of the ancient homes of the cactus pear, Mexico, ran a breeding program in the s. Like most true cactus species, prickly pears are native only to the Americas.
Through human action, they have since been introduced to many other areas of the world. In the United Statesprickly pears are native to many areas of the arid, semi-arid, and drought-prone Western and South Central United States, including the lower elevations of the Rocky Mountains and southern Great Plainswhere species such as O.
Prickly pear cactus is also native to sandy coastal beach scrub environments of the East Coast from Florida to southern Connecticutwhere O. Additionally, the eastern prickly pear is native to the midwestern "sand prairies" near major river systems, such as the Mississippi, Illinois, and Ohio rivers.
Opuntia species are the most cold-tolerant of the lowland cacti, extending into western and southern Canada. One subspeciesO. Prickly pears produce a fruit known as tunacommonly eaten in Mexico and in the Mediterranean regionwhich is also used to make aguas frescas.
In the Galápagos Islandsthe Galápagos prickly pear, O. Prickly pears are a prime source of food for the common giant tortoises in the Galápagos Islands, so they are important in the food web.