When the goal is well worth the pain...

A new garden means new plantings and for me, as many native plants as possible.

The area were our home stands in Park City was just covered with sagebrush and prickly pear cacti (Opuntia) before housing appeared there in the early 1970s, so I always make a point to transplant these beautiful cacti that will bloom by the end of June once they're established.

This said, picking them from where they live and resettling them into a perfect spot in my garden takes a lot of suffering because – even through my thick work gloves – their hairlike, ultra-thin prickles called glochids, easily penetrate the leather before migrating all over my hand and fingers as they detach from the plant.

Since they're so thin, they're invisible to the naked eye and the best tweezers in the world can't do much to remove them, but again as we say: “No pain, no gain!”