Courtesy of CNN, this series of 11 gardens are something to see. I'd love to visit all of them some day add to my Bucket List? See them all @ http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/27/travel/when-art-design-and-plants-collide/index.html
If I had a cactus garden, I would live in the ER. I cannot be withing ten feet of one without getting needles stuck somewhere in me.
When I was a kid in LA, my grandmother had cacti and succulents in her yard. I guess I got used to them because I learned to go through them without getting pricked. Am working on a new novel in which desert plants pay a part. When I get it all sorted out, I plan on a blog post listing them and what they're supposedly good for. An example: Nopal or prickly pear cactus is a good supplement to one's diet as it helps control blood sugar and has other health benefits. Diced Nopal is available in just about every Latino/Hispanic supermarket or bodega.
I have a few cacti that I have Deckel-proofed by putting them in pots that spend the growing season on upside-down 5 gallon buckets in places I do not work near along the fringe of the property lines. They are not well suited for outside in my climate. They will live, but they look rather wretched after east coast winters. They are almost all pass-along plants from people except for some that were given to me by the lady at Lowe's who was tossing them in the garbage as they were starter plants nobody bought and they had to get rid of.
