Whenever drought removes grasses Opuntia (prickly pear) covers the land. The Opuntia descended from Cretaceous ancestry in South America; then some early forms migrated into North America during the warm part of the Pliocene Epoch about four million years ago. Having adapted to arid conditions, the prickly pear’s situation, like that of grasses, expanded and contracted with the Pleistocene’s conditions. Though not impervious to the driest conditions, the prickly pear evolved some drought protections; since leaves lose moisture, Opuntias got rid of their leaves and turned their flattened stems into energy-gathering pads called cladodes. The evolved skin became thick and waxy to hold the water content around 90%. Like the grama grasses, the roots reach out widely and are shallow enough to catch mid-drought sprinkles. On open soil without competition, the Opuntia covered the landscape.The whole plant is edible any time of the year but is especially desired in the spring when the first cladodes appear: the thornless (except for the tiny brown glochids) , easily consumed nopalitos. These and the more fibrous summertime cladodes contain up to 8% protein (corn has 10%) as well as important vitamins. Archeologists have found cladodes in dry West Texas rock-shelters (the Erath County shelters are too moist to preserve vegetation) cladodes split laterally and stuffed with small fish, lizards and other foods,

likely acorn meal. They are thought to have been used as cooking pockets that were laid over coals and steamed. The purple tunas are loaded with 70% sugar and were rolled in the coals to remove the tiny glochids and eaten raw, stored, brewed into beverage or dried as fruit leather.

Dan Young. Unpublished Manuscript, 2022.