Southern Arizona, Western New Mexico, and Northern Sonora
A handsome baby cactus, aggregata occurs usually in clumps, is two to five inches tall and almost as broad, with twenty or forty sharp needlelike thorns a half-inch or so long, tan or light pink, their ends forming twisted tips of white or reddish brown, and intermixed with fifteen or more rows of angled tubercles which bear the spine clusters. Beware of getting a “retrorsely barbed” thorn into the hand! Laceration ensues and much difficulty in extraction, for Nature has given these, her baby cacti, sharp and relentless protectors. A popular fellow for rock gardens is aggregata on account of his symmetrical and globose head, forming a cushion of bright pink or rose-purple blossoms which come forth to greet the world for but a day, then fold their dainty petals and are no more.
Arizona Pincushion (Coryphantha or Mammillaria arizonica)
Northern Arizona (Kingman, Phoenix)
We have traveled over halfway across the premier cactus state, and are approaching the mighty Grand Cañon of the Colorado, that great fissure in the earth’s surface worn by water erosion throughout the ages. Hereabouts several new colonies of cacti are to be seen. The Arizona Pincushion is a conspicuous but not at all common fellow, easily recognized by his abundant dark-colored spines, in fact almost hidden by this dense growth of stout dangerous-looking reddish brown and black thorns, borne on the tubercles and about half an inch long. Arizonica is the tiniest of all the baby cacti, scarcely more than an inch tall and just as broad; occasionally reaching the height of two or three inches. The flowers, clustering in groups of three and five blossoms, are like a dainty bell, the petals and sepals narrow and lance-shaped, occurring in attractive rose or rose-purple and tan shades.
California Pincushion (Mammillaria tetrancistera)
Northern and Central Arizona, Southern California, Southern Utah, and Southern Nevada
Heading southward from the Grand Cañon we find in the area north of Phoenix, Arizona, a most beautiful distinctive Pincushion which we recognize as native to California. Indeed so abundant is it in the foothills back from Los Angeles, on the road from Big Bear Lake and out on the Mojave Desert, that this round cactus is known as California’s Pincushion. Two to twelve inches tall, about two and one-half inches broad, it has eight rows of tubercles set in a symmetrical spiral over the pale green body, protected by forty to sixty delicate white radial thorns, slender as a needle, covering the entire plant, and one to four reddish brown hooked central spines, surrounded by a dark halo of deep purple blossoms. Bright scarlet is the fruit, but not edible as are the fruits of several related species.
Black Spined Pincushion (Mammillaria Milleri)
Northern Arizona (Phoenix, Kingman)