Staghorn Cholla

Large, 2 1/4″ wide flowers come in an amazingly wide variety of colors and have yellow-green anther filaments and white to bronze styles. (This is one way to distinguish from Buck-horn Cholla. Its flower anther filaments are purple-red.) The rounded, mostly spineless, yellow-green to reddish purple fruits stay attached to the stems all winter and often grow like a chain, one out of the other. The immature fruits are green and bumpy but the mature fruits swell to become smooth and plump, and they remain on the plant while it is flowering. The stems are spiny, green to reddish purple in color, and shaped like deer antlers (stag horns). This cactus readily hybridizes with other Chollas, making it quite variable in appearance.