I’ll take you up on that offer 
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Could be pretty quick, but you need the variation to select from. I can’t claim to have made an exhaustive search, but I’ve never seen a fruit that’s appreciably bigger or smaller than others within the species. I suspect there must be some out there, but it would likely be at least several generations of breeding the largest-fruited specimens together before you get notable improvement. The other thing I’ve noticed, is that when I do find smaller fruits, the seed to pulp ratio is the same (could be because it’s just the smallest fruit on the same plant). I think improving the seed to pulp ratio would actually be a better target than fruit size.
If I have time tomorrow I will get a few pics of the ones I have growing. Pretty big variation in fruit size!
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Nice! Care to do some controlled crosses?
I’ll think about it…the best fruiting ones are the spiniest!
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Prickly pear fruit or pads are great for reducing inflammation. Love eating cactus Prickly Pear Cactus
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That was so beautifully written. Thank you
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I’ve eyed this listing on EFN several times, but haven’t committed. It’s probably O stricta or a hybrid, but take a close look at the cut open fruit in the picture. Notice that even though the fruit is much larger with more pulp than a standard O humifusa, the seed to pulp ratio still looks about the same.
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Fruit comparison
From bottom to top: Barr’s Dwarf, Mesa Sky, and Mississippi Unk. Back right is Inermis (Eastern prickly pear).
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Thanks for the pics! That is some good fruit variation. Have you tried eating any of them? Mississippi Unk. and Oklahoma Pancake look like O engelmanii to me. Maybe Mesa sky, too, but that could be a large-padded O macrorhiza or phaecantha. Engelmanii is supposed to be less hardy than O humifusa, but I had a cutting of an Arizona specimen outside in a pot in Kansas that leads me to believe it can handle at least to 6A, which is better than it’s usually given credit for.
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Per the coldhardycactus website, Oklahoma pancake is O. gilvescens and Mesa Sky is O. phaeacantha. No clue what the Mississippi one is, got it in a trade years ago. It suffers some winter injury each year, so I’d say it’s zone 6/7 hardy.
I might try a few this weekend once I finish getting glochids out of my hands.
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I suspect they’d know better than I do. USDA lists gilvescens as a synonym of phaecantha, but I’d believe it either way. Good luck with the glochids!
Thanks for all the info! Where I work I have been drooling over some quart containers of
O. humisifolia for a few months. At $11 each I was wondering how they would work.
I recall in youth a friend of mine in SE WI had a pile of prickly pear on the south side of their house. I was dumbfounded that a cactus could survive our winters but they did.
Years later I found historical records of when Wisconsin was surveyed in the 19th century and the surveyors marked native prickly pear in several areas of my home state.
I always wondered if any of these native sites still existed with them.
I think I will have to plant two on the south side of my brick house. Nice and hot there in the summer time.
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Our tunas out west seem generally to be larger than the eastern ones. This is a variety from Chile, grown in SoCal. Called tuna de Tiltil, or melon tuna. Excellent flavor reminiscent of honeydew melon…
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Here’s a variety I picked up off the street in a Chicano area of La Habra, CA. Its pads are particularly good as a vegetable. Flavor of the fruit is also excellent.
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From Chile
From La Habra
Excellent vegetables!
I use a dry fibrous plastic scouring pad to knock off the spines. Quick and easy. Dry wadded paper towels will also work, but not as well, and they don’t last well if you’re doing a lot of them. Wear gloves.
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Ah, man. Now you’re just making us jealous! Nice tip on the spine removal techniques. I’ll have to give them a try.
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I may have to revise my statement on the skin vs. pulp. @ampersand was kind enough to send me some cuttings of Oklahoma Pancake and Barr’s Dwarf. Barr’s had some fruits on it, which I tried, of course. Interestingly, the skin section had that punchy flavor that is only in the pulp on the cactus I have already. So, even though the fruit is smaller, it makes for a good eating fruit as the inner pulp and the fleshy skin both have a similar flavor. Just pop it in your mouth (sans spines) and you’re good to go! I look forward to trying out the Oklahoma Pancake fruits in the future.
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Cleaning up my cactus bed a little today and I found 3 or 4 tiny seedlings. Does anyone want them? I suspect they were from Mesa Sky, that’s the variety directly above the seedlings. Seedlings are are maybe an inch tall.
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