Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Cactus #18 - What's in a Name?


Today's cactus is actually a succulent.  There are a lot of succulents planted amongst the cactus here at Canyon Sands.

What's the difference?  All cacti are succulents, but not all succulents are cacti.  What makes a cactus a cactus is not the spines, as you might think, but something called areoles.  An areole is the little fluffly part that the spine grows from.

So perhaps I need to rename my series "29 Succulents".  "29 Cactus" sounds much better although I now realize that this isn't grammatically correct and should have been "29 Cacti".

Oh well.  What's in a name, anyway?

No comments: