Native plant identification key for the
Palos Verdes Peninsula, California


Elliptic to round, usually 16-25 cm long, but some very large: ~30 cm long by 15 cm wide, generally larger than the similar O. littoralis, less densely spiny than O. oricola, whorls of 5-16 spines usually ~2- 2.5 cm long, whorls spaced in a nearly perfect rectangular grid on the platyclades, but the spacing among them is wider than seen in O. littoralis. Spines are translucent yellow when new, darkening in age. They may be recurved or twisted. Found more widely than O. littoralis, from the western Transverse Ranges, through Palos Verdes and the Channel Islands, to the South Coast and western Peninsular Ranges into Baja, predominantly in chaparral, but also in coastal sage scrub and cactus shrub, and at higher elevations than O. littoralis (40 m up to 2,050 m). Cactus up to 2 m tall, upright in growth form but spreading into extensive masses; flowers yellow to red, with many stamens, flowering from May to June; pear-shaped, orange to red edible fruit about 2.5-6 cm long (cactus figs, tuna, nopales).

Opuntia oricola (Cactaceae): chaparral prickly pear, prickly pear, nopales, tuna


First placed on web: 07/29/11
Last revised: 07/29/11
Christine M. Rodrigue, Ph.D., Department of Geography, California State University, Long Beach, CA 90840-1101
rodrigue@csulb.edu

The development of this key was partially funded through the Geoscience Diversity Enhancement Program (Award #0703798) and through a course of re-assigned time provided by the CSULB Scholarly and Creative Activities Committee. Thanks also to the students in sections of biogeography, introductory physical geography, GDEP, and LSAMP for "test-driving" various editions of this key.