Cold Climate Cactus

These Opuntia fragilis pads are being kept under lights for four days to insure that they are dry. On April 18th we traveled to make sure we could find the collection site. We were surprised to find that the colony we were taking propagation materials from had been disturbed. Very little damage, but construction had disturbed some of the pads at the outer edge of this colony. These disturbed pads were chosen as collection material over taking more from the center of the colony. They provided about half of the needed collection materials, and the rest of the pads were taken from the edges of the plants in the middle of the colony. They will rest under the lights and then be set up in conditions for rooting next.