How to Decorate Cactus and Succulents With Lights
How to Decorate Cactus and Succulents With Lights
In the Southwest and other arid climates, cactus and succulents replace ornamental shrubs and trees as landscaping. With the philosophy of playing up what you have rather than trying to hide it or substitute something else, home decorators have been decorating cacti with holiday lights for several years.
So, how do you string lights on a succulent or spiny cactus?
Very carefully, for starters. Wear a pair of suede or leather gloves that can't be penetrated by the needle-like spines of a cactus, which can even poke through the strongest types of gloves.
Ethel M Chocolates' breathtaking Botanical Cactus Garden is Nevada's largest and one of the world's biggest collections of its kind. Based on the English landscape model of naturalistic design, the Ethel M Botanical Cactus Garden features four acres of cacti, succulents and other drought-tolerant plants and trees.
The factory was named after the mother of the founder, Forrest Mars, and is the company's gourmet chocolate and candy division. In 2012, Ethel M's expects more than 100,000 people to visit the light display this year, which usually opens mid November and runs through New Year's Day. Admission is free.
Magical Light Display
With a landscape base of 15,000 cubic yards of sandy fill and a special planting soil, the beds were raised and rookeries constructed using 400 tons of rock, thereby providing the best possible viewing experience for visitors.
To enhance your experience at the botanical garden, you can buy 3D glasses in the gift shop that make the lights twinkle like snowflakes.
Lighting Up the Night
The Cactus Botanical Gardens at Nevada's Ethel M Chocolate Factory is host to more than 300 species of plants. Half are cacti and succulents largely native to the American Southwest, while others are desert trees and shrubs from the Southwest along with, Australia and South America. All of these plants were chosen both for the beauty of their floral displays and their ability to adapt to the climate of southern Nevada.
The types of rock used are Utah Bali Hai chocolate and Arizona moss rock (from the nearby Grand Canyon region). Among the cactus and succulents:
Penguin and Cacti
The cactus garden displays more than a half-million lights, which lighting designer Steve Bowdoin and crew meticulously place on prickly and sometimes-delicate cacti and succulents. Since there is no manual on How to Light and Decorate Cactus and Succulents, Bowdoin has learned by trial and error, along with his expertise and familiarity with the plants and the environment. It takes Bowdoin and his crew about six weeks to take down all the lights each January.
Barrel Cactus Decorated With Lights
A group of barrel cactus have been carefully strung with LED light strands and are ready to light up the nighttime desert wonderland at the Ethel M Chocolate Factory and Desert Botanical Garden.
Barrel cactus fall into two types: Ferocactus and Echinocactus. Most can be found in the southwestern desert regions of the United States.
Facts about Barrel cactus:
Blue Christmas
A small tree takes on an entirely different look at night when the lights come on and it gets to show off its blue leaves. The tree is just one of Garden is more than 300 species of plants to be found at the three-acre Ethel M Chocolate Factory and Desert Botanical Garden near Las Vegas.
Approximately 40 percent of the lights are LED, with more added each year.
What is a Cactus?
Steve Bowdoin is a landscape designer and has been illuminating the Desert Botanical Garden at the Ethel M Chocolate Factory in Henderson, Nevada, for more than five years. Bowdoin begins his cactus display prep during the summer, when he sorts through light strands and takes inventory of what needs to be added or replaced. He and his crew begin hanging the lights on October 1st of each year to be ready for the garden's mid-November opening.
·
Landscape and lighting designer Steve Bowdoin shows how to cover a shrub with lights, gesturing over the top of the hedge to indicate that full and complete coverage is necessary to cover it with net lights and outline or capture its true shape. Each cactus, succulent, tree and shrub presents different challenges for the designer and his team, who must work around prickly spines (needles), delicate succulents, branches, tall trees and unusual foliage from specimens like the Joshua tree.
Unique Shapes Make a Magical Display
In the Southwest and other arid climates, cactus and succulents replace ornamental shrubs and trees as landscaping. With the philosophy of playing up what you have rather than trying to hide it or substitute something else, home decorators have been decorating cacti with holiday lights for several years.
So, how do you string lights on a succulent or spiny cactus?
Very carefully, for starters. Wear a pair of suede or leather gloves that can't be penetrated by the needle-like spines of a cactus, which can even poke through the strongest types of gloves.
Ethel M Chocolates' breathtaking Botanical Cactus Garden is Nevada's largest and one of the world's biggest collections of its kind. Based on the English landscape model of naturalistic design, the Ethel M Botanical Cactus Garden features four acres of cacti, succulents and other drought-tolerant plants and trees.
The factory was named after the mother of the founder, Forrest Mars, and is the company's gourmet chocolate and candy division. In 2012, Ethel M's expects more than 100,000 people to visit the light display this year, which usually opens mid November and runs through New Year's Day. Admission is free.
Magical Light Display
With a landscape base of 15,000 cubic yards of sandy fill and a special planting soil, the beds were raised and rookeries constructed using 400 tons of rock, thereby providing the best possible viewing experience for visitors.
To enhance your experience at the botanical garden, you can buy 3D glasses in the gift shop that make the lights twinkle like snowflakes.
Lighting Up the Night
The Cactus Botanical Gardens at Nevada's Ethel M Chocolate Factory is host to more than 300 species of plants. Half are cacti and succulents largely native to the American Southwest, while others are desert trees and shrubs from the Southwest along with, Australia and South America. All of these plants were chosen both for the beauty of their floral displays and their ability to adapt to the climate of southern Nevada.
The types of rock used are Utah Bali Hai chocolate and Arizona moss rock (from the nearby Grand Canyon region). Among the cactus and succulents:
- Acacia: The Twisted Acacia
- Agave: Including the big and beautiful Agave Americana, aka Century Plant or Maguey's Century Plant and Agave attenuata
- Aloe: There are more than 500 species of aloe; the most common or familiar is Aloe vera
- Ferocactus cylindraceus: Compass Barrel Cactus
Penguin and Cacti
The cactus garden displays more than a half-million lights, which lighting designer Steve Bowdoin and crew meticulously place on prickly and sometimes-delicate cacti and succulents. Since there is no manual on How to Light and Decorate Cactus and Succulents, Bowdoin has learned by trial and error, along with his expertise and familiarity with the plants and the environment. It takes Bowdoin and his crew about six weeks to take down all the lights each January.
Barrel Cactus Decorated With Lights
A group of barrel cactus have been carefully strung with LED light strands and are ready to light up the nighttime desert wonderland at the Ethel M Chocolate Factory and Desert Botanical Garden.
Barrel cactus fall into two types: Ferocactus and Echinocactus. Most can be found in the southwestern desert regions of the United States.
Facts about Barrel cactus:
- Can store up to and sometimes more than 500 kilograms of water
- Have the potential to live to 100 years or more
- Barrel cacti are probably the most dangerous cacti in the desert (or out of it). A puncture by one of the cactus' spines (thorns) that penetrates the skin 1/8 inch or so warrants treatment by a doctor: you may need antibiotics and it can take several months for the would to heal.
- Flowers bloom on old growth, and are up to 3 inches wide and grow in a ring around the top.
- Grown easily by seed.
- Can contain up to 25 vertical ribs.
- Size: up to 5 feet high by 2 feet wide.
- Flower colors: Orange or yellow-orange.
Blue Christmas
A small tree takes on an entirely different look at night when the lights come on and it gets to show off its blue leaves. The tree is just one of Garden is more than 300 species of plants to be found at the three-acre Ethel M Chocolate Factory and Desert Botanical Garden near Las Vegas.
Approximately 40 percent of the lights are LED, with more added each year.
What is a Cactus?
Steve Bowdoin is a landscape designer and has been illuminating the Desert Botanical Garden at the Ethel M Chocolate Factory in Henderson, Nevada, for more than five years. Bowdoin begins his cactus display prep during the summer, when he sorts through light strands and takes inventory of what needs to be added or replaced. He and his crew begin hanging the lights on October 1st of each year to be ready for the garden's mid-November opening.
·
Landscape and lighting designer Steve Bowdoin shows how to cover a shrub with lights, gesturing over the top of the hedge to indicate that full and complete coverage is necessary to cover it with net lights and outline or capture its true shape. Each cactus, succulent, tree and shrub presents different challenges for the designer and his team, who must work around prickly spines (needles), delicate succulents, branches, tall trees and unusual foliage from specimens like the Joshua tree.
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