How to Grow and Care for Organ Pipe Cactus Stenocereus thurberi
Icon of the southwest, organ pipe cactus (Stenocereus thurberi) is one of the best known species of cacti in the United States.
Reaching up to 26 feet in height and 12 feet wide, this slow-growing, long-lived sun lover can be truly enormous.
Tough, tenacious, and armed to the teeth, this cactus is the perfect example of evolution’s elegant engineering.
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Given scarce water, organ pipe can expand its stems and store water internally. In the blistering heat of its native range, this cactus protects itself with tough skin and bristling spines.
To keep its fragile flowers protected from the hot sun, S. thurberi blooms at night when it can also take advantage of the region’s pollinating bats.
Although this cactus is tailor-made for Mexico and the American Southwest’s harshest landscapes, northern gardeners, don’t despair!
Given plenty of sunlight and heat, some low-nutrient soil, and just a little water, organ pipe can be grown in a pot.
And for southern gardeners, given the right conditions, this cactus can thrive in gardens there, too.
Here’s a quick preview of everything you’ll learn as you read along:
What Is Organ Pipe Cactus?
A member of the Cactaceae, or cactus family, the organ pipe cactus bears all the hallmarks of this spiny, spiky, desert-dwelling group.
Growing from a low trunk, it promptly branches out into tall, leggy stems, which look more like arms, or even tentacles, to us.
It’s this multi-limbed appearance that makes S. thurberi, with a bit of imagination, look like a multi-piped church organ and that gives it its common name.
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