Organ Pipe Cactus
ORGAN PIPE CACTUS
ARIZONA, USA
This majestic and healthy Organ Pipe Cactus, (Stenocereus thurberi) was ‘captured’ in the midday light, on a cloudless hot day. It is located in the Sonoran Desert of the extreme Southwestern US and Northwestern Mexico and Baja. The ancient range of this endemic cactus now centers in the Sonoran Desert region of the Organ Pipe National Monument and UNESCO Biosphere site in Arizona and the El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere reserve in Mexico. This species range straddles the US- Mexico border wall and extends through western Mexico and throughout Baja. It grows nowhere else in the world. It is protected in the United States and Mexico.
Blooming only at night, from May to July, it is pollinated by nectivorous bats and depends upon them for the continuation of the species. Mexican long tongue bats and the lesser nosed bat feed off the nectar of the cactus flower. They return in the summer to feed off the fruit, as do many other cactus creatures. Those seeds are not digested well and are dispersed throughout the animals range, which corresponds with the range of the Organ Pipe cactus and Saguaro cactus. The young seedlings need the shade and relative moisture beneath Palo Verde, Creosote and Desert Ironwood shrubs. As they get bigger, with more extensive root systems, they will diminish the health of the species that gave it shade and moisture in early years. The ‘give and take’ of the balance of this desert ecology are unique to the Sonoran Desert region.
Just to the east of the Organ Pipe National Monument and Biosphere reserve, in both the US and Mexico, are the ancestral lands of the Tohono O’odham, the ‘Desert People’. These indigenous people have lived in the Sonoran Desert for thousands of years and used the fruit of the Organ Pipe and Saguaro as part of their food gathering and nutritional needs. The substantial cactus ribs are a necessary building material. The ‘Desert People’ have an indelible connection to the plants and animals that inhabit this fragile ecosystem. They were a semi- nomadic people before the Spanish found and made significant changes to the area in the 1600’s.
Before the Mexican -American war and the modern substantial wall that has been built as a boundary line between the US and Mexico, these native people lived in peace and a with a marginal existence.
The US and Mexico gave the current territory/ reserve to the Tohono O’odham, which straddles the current border of each country. Their native foods, building materials and spiritual connection is with the land and the unique plants and animals that live with them.
PHOTOGRAPH OF A TOHONO O'ODHAM WOMAN BY EDWARD CURTIS (1905)
The incursion of modern humans not attuned to living in the desert and their development , brought difficulties for the native people and biota. Habitat destruction, poor building choices, non regional landscape planting, competition for water, elimination of bat species and Palo Verde trees and Creosote - are all reasons that this unique Organ Pipe cactus plant is found mostly in the remote and protected areas of the country of Mexico.
I have photographed several of these extraordinary cactus in the wild- this is my favorite. Long Organ Pipe ‘arms’ sprawl and fall down, due to their weight from water storage. This individual has kept the upward reach and density of arms …..and ‘spoke’ to me of the energy and resilience of nature and this fragile habitat.
I have spent time in the National Monument and Biosphere, in the summer, just at the end of the ‘monsoons’ of the southwest. The desert was alive and blooms were aplenty. Cactus arms were swelling with the storage of new water. Staying hydrated and avoiding heat exhaustion was a priority for humans. Ducking around the shade of the Palo Verde and rock outcroppings, hiking through canyons, I was able to capture several wonderful cactus portraitures.
I used the Leica D-Lux 7 for its small, light size, weight, zoom and extraordinary light capturing abilities.
