giving birth

When the tulips bloom, a flower bud emerges from the center of the leaves, grows and develops in an easy sort of way. With deciduous fruit trees, the buds formed from last years growth are hanging out on the twigs, and when spring comes, they swell and burst open.  But when the claret cup cacti bloom, it is not the gentle cuddly process that you might imagine. I had imagined that a tiny bud would develop at at the junction among the spines. But instead, the plants have a smooth, protective waxy epidermis that shows no sign of a bud until it is ruptured open in what appears to be a most painful brutish way to allow for growth of the emerging bud. It seems similar to the process of giving birth, although even with that process, there is a predetermined channel. This is more like a c-section. Or Ripley's Alien birth.

 Mama!

Hssss.

 You can see the splitting of the epidermis at the 12:00 position of the bud.

I thought this E. reichenbachii var. baileyi had an easier time of it, until I looked closer. It's hard to tell. Maybe it is just smaller and harder to see. Or maybe they just have it easier.

With E. reichenbachii perbellus there is some disruption of the structure, but not the dramatic eruptive process of E. triglochidiatus.

It's hard to tell with E. reichenbachii var. caespitosus due to all the fuzz, but it seems to be more of the process that I had imagined.

When the flowers drop, all the cacti have scars where the flowers were. The scars get smaller, but if you look closely, you see that the plants have them for the rest of their lives.

The bud scar from last year to the left, with unbloomed aereoles  above and below, among the new buds.