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Fake Cactus

Revised on 09/23/2005 00:27

Arizona is a state of many contrasts: high desert, pine forests, mountainous midlands, and the low HARSH Sonoran Desert.  Cactus is ubiquitous in the state.  The justly famous, stately Saguaro (Carnegiea gigantea) punctuates the southwestern corner.

Cactus thrives with benign neglect or with care-and-feeding.  They don’t seem to care.  So why have fake cactus in your yard, at all?  Walk in the dez barefooted.  You will become an instant collector!

August 30, 2003 Field Trip

All the fake cactuses, but one, were Saguaros ... but I did NOT take any shots of golfing Kokopellies, howling 18-ga coyotes, steel quail, cast-iron desert tortoises, or Zig-Zag-rolling cowpokes in silhouette.

On the  first day took fifty-seven shots -- a few were dups -- over a two-hour bike ride over about three square miles -- I went down EVERY road in Mesa Del Sol!  I particularly like the juxtaposition between false cacti and REAL ones!

August 31, 2003 Field Trip

Sunday I did the same snoop tour over across Fortuna Wash into the depths of the mobile/manufactured home area. 

A treasure trove, indeed!

Steel saguaro silhouettes on gates have been found to be a glut, as are strap iron "suns".  (On 09/10/03 I saw a five-foot-tall sheet metal Saguaro at the Yuma (AZ) Lowes -- $295.00 US!)  From now on we are pin-pointing the weirder side of  Fake Cactus -- beer can cactus, barbed wire Saguaros ... who knows what  evil lurks ... ?

Well, I can easily understand that I have to limit my work:

a) Free-standing fake cactus

b) Multiples

c) Otherwise odd or bizarre

My rides continue -- they also demonstrate where all the ceramic statues offered at Tijuana border crossings really end up: frogs, Bald Eagles, "American" eagles, hawks, bathtub Marys, elephants, formally-dressed Indian elephants, mice, rabbits, bunnies, kitties, butterflies, howling coyotes, coyote pups, lizards, geckos, sun plaques, turtles, ships, roadrunners, dwarves (but never the "Seven"), gargoyles, gazing globes (popular in the Midwest!) gnomes, big-eyed DeGrazia-type dogs, miniature wagon wheels, gingerbread houses, sleeping Mexicans, life-like full size true color Rottweilers (but w/o the dog bombs!), cactus of course, skulls (cow), flowers, windmills, bird houses, donkeys, carts, Dutch girls, Dutch boyz, seagulls, dolphins, owls, but NO Homer Simpsons?!  Go figger that.

September  16, 2003

So I stopped to snap a  painted ceramic mini-Saguaro and this dude in a golf cart sez, to me: "That ain't real!"

"Well, D'uh!"

The lot below has six (6) beer can saguaros! 

Find 'em! 

Great fun!