Our night blooming cerus attracted a visitor. Is this a cerus? I think so. It is now anyway. Sometimes we have more than 30 larger-than-your-hand-sized blooms on that cactus. Have you met our new pet bee? We are taking up bee-keeping. Not bees-keeping. Just the one. Doing our part to prevent Colony Collapse Disorder and therefore world destruction.

My great-grandmother in Alabama had a gorgeous backyard with a fishing pond. Along one side was a vegetation-covered corridor and I loved to walk around the pond to get to the fantasy world under those arched green shadows. Depending on which way you walked around the pond, you either passed her beehive before the tunnel or afterward. The bees terrified me, especially in those swarming massive numbers, so I made myself inconspicuous as possible when in their general area.

Do I need to state explicitly that we aren’t getting a hive? Well, there you have it, and our vari cacti don’t all bloom at night. My prickly pear blooms in the daytime and I have three sorts.

I have orange flowers (lots of them):

I have yellow flowers (just this one, but the promise of more):

And I have orange and yellow flowers (not sure this one is prickly pear):

I’m thinking of doing some tuna harvesting and making stuff.

On edit: I didn’t pay much attention to sizing, but the photos are much prettier when really big, so click on them to see up close.