Two Spineless Cacti.

The smaller brown one is metal. We bought it at a place down the road that carries a lot of whimsical metal objects, including full size dinosaurs peering over the fence. Some of the locals frown on the 'tackiness' of this place but we love it with it's random collection of plants, seeds, pet food, sun hats and gardening gloves. We thought the rusty metal cactus was quite a funny addition to our rather arid hill garden made up mostly of spiky plants. 

One day David, our friend and contractor who was working on our kitchen at the time brought over a single paddle of a Luther Burbank spineless cactus (developed as cattle fodder but for some reason it never took off). He and John went out and stuck it in the ground up there and we all forgot about it. It grew, rather slowly at first, and never produced more than one fruit. Coming from a shady garden in Berkeley, I was never much of a fan of spiky, agaves and cacti, but as this has grown ever larger over the years I have come to like it. This year it has assumed a more symmetrical shape and  produced numerous fruits. It dwarfs the original metal one but makes for a rather interesting contrast.

I didn't take any other pictures today as I play nursemaid to the ever improving Spike. He really is a marvel. It's hard to tell what his eyes will look like as he has stitches in the corners to protect the incision so when he opens his eyes they are rather slitty and red. He bashes his way around the house as the cone seems to impair his remaining senses so that he can't use his echo location or sniffing skills. We've rearranged the furniture to eliminate sharp corners which the cone seemed to direct directly into his face. We have a very genteel leashed walk around the garden several times a day followed by the administration of steriods and antibiotics in both pill and eyedrop form. Getting the drops into his slitty, gooey, still rather sore eyes is a challenge, but he does have prosthetic eyes which will reveal themselves more fully in due course. He is uncomplaining and really wanted to chase his Kong this morning. He can't really find it or pick it up very easily so we settled for the compromise in extras. 

Thank you again for all your kind comments and concerns about the boy. We're all quite content to just hang out, recover from a couple of weeks of worried anticipation and amazing recovery....