Yesterday morning, I discovered something ate a good portion of one of the super-spiny native cactus plants in my yard.
Upon finding the partially
consumed cactus, I stood there, staring down at it, dumbfounded. I can’t touch one of the damned things
without crying out in pain. Eating one
is out of the question. Thing is, a
bunch of the cactus was consumed.
Something truly worked at eating it for breakfast.
Who or what can eat a cactus?
I have posted a couple
images of the cactus as I found it. We
commonly call this type of cactus a pincushion or ball cactus. The Montana Field Guide marks them as
a spinystar cactus.
Again, who can eat a cactus?
I hopped onboard my computing
machine and googled this: “What animal
eats cactus?”
Surprisingly, three animals
that possibly scurry about my landscape landed on the list: woodrats (known as
pack rats in my hometown of East Helena, Montana), jack rabbits, and ground
squirrels (referred to as gophers in any bar in Montana).
Not sure which of the three
might be responsible, but I am slightly impressed. That is some delicate work right there.
—Mitchell Hegman
No comments:
Post a Comment