Today my brother, friend and I went dirt bike riding near Florence Junction on the way to Florence. It was a nice day with some cloud cover. Shortly after riding I noticed some snake tracks in the path. I made note of where they were so we could check on it on our way back. Heading on we saw two large jackrabbits running near the trail and then off into the desert. As we were riding, I noticed that the prickly pare cactus had its fruits in bloom. All year my brother and I have been waiting for them to bloom after reading that they are good to eat. So now was our chance. You have to be careful with these because they have many glochids on them, each with tons of tiny hairs that are a big nuisance if they get in your fingers. So we carefully removed one from the end of the pad. They are redish pink in color on the tops of the green pads. I cut a hole in one and squeezed the oozing liquid and seeds out into my mouth. I sucked the liquid from the many seeds and then spit the seeds out. The flavor was pretty sweet and good. Because there are so many seeds they are a little annoying but not bad. They remind me of pomegranate because of the seeds. And a good source of food if you are lost out in the desert at this time of the year. I had read that they taste like kiwis and watermelon but my brother thought they tasted like cherries. I think they all have some credence. We took three with us and headed back to the truck to put it in the cooler.
On the way back we stopped at the snake tracks. We followed it into some holes around a creosote plant and out of another. There were three different tracks either going from a hole along the path to the desert, or the desert to a whole, or right across the trail. But there was no sign of the snake. It was most likely a rattlesnake or a gopher snake. Both would easily eat the Round-tailed Ground Squirrels in the area. After some more riding and grabbing some more prickly pare fruit to take home we called it a day.
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