{"id":1485,"date":"2025-11-15T06:00:33","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T12:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/?p=1485"},"modified":"2025-11-15T06:00:33","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T12:00:33","slug":"opuntiophagous-vertebrates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/opuntiophagous-vertebrates\/","title":{"rendered":"Opuntiaphagous Vertebrates"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Photograph = male baboons with Opuntia in Africa)<\/sup><\/p>\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s a mouthful of a title. What does it mean? Opuntiaphagous<\/em> comes from two parts: Opuntia<\/em> and -phagous<\/em>. We all know what Opuntia<\/em> means. Phagous<\/em> (from Greek) means \u201ceating.\u201d So, opuntiaphagous<\/em> means \u201ceating Opuntia<\/em>.\u201d Vertebrates are animals with backbones\u2014turtles, lizards, birds, cows, goats, and more.<\/p>\n

The Details<\/h3>\n

Park Nobel edited a 2002 book about cacti. In Chapter 7, the authors described vertebrates known to eat Opuntia<\/em> (or some part of an Opuntia<\/em>).<\/p>\n

Fruit is the most commonly eaten part, but seeds, nectar, pollen, cladodes, and even roots are also taken.<\/p>\n

Tortoises, iguanas, and certain lizards eat various parts of Opuntia<\/em>. Ostriches, emus, doves, and quail are all known to eat some portion, too. Rabbits, jackrabbits, ground squirrels, and sloths eat Opuntia<\/em>. Gray foxes, porcupines, and black bears have been observed eating it. Bison, mule deer, and goats also consume Opuntia<\/em>.<\/p>\n

In all, 89 vertebrate species (including humans) have been reported to eat Opuntia<\/em>. The authors note that the topic is seldom studied and many observations are incidental. Opuntias<\/em> are studied a lot in the United States, so records may be uneven across regions. It\u2019s likely that many more vertebrates eat Opuntia<\/em> but simply haven\u2019t been reported. To date, few comprehensive studies seem to exist.<\/p>\n

Additional Reading:\u00a0Vertebrate Consumption of Opuntias<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Lizard, <\/a>
Lizard, TricksyDicksy <\/div> <\/div>
\"Cactus <\/a>
Cactus finch, Aposematic <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Roundtail <\/a>
Roundtail Squirrel, Lon and Queta <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Goat, <\/a>
Goat, Kaleb <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Gopherus <\/a>
Gopherus polyphemus, Andrea Westmoreland <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Horse <\/a>
Horse with Opuntia ficus-indica, Kim Starr <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Photograph = male baboons with Opuntia in Africa) Introduction It\u2019s a mouthful of a title. What does it mean? Opuntiaphagous comes from two parts: Opuntia and -phagous. We all know what Opuntia means. Phagous (from Greek) means \u201ceating.\u201d So, opuntiaphagous means \u201ceating Opuntia.\u201d Vertebrates are animals with backbones\u2014turtles, lizards, birds, cows, goats, and more. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1496,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-1485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animals","tag-biology"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/baboons.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1485"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6876,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1485\/revisions\/6876"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/opuntiads.com\/oblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}