Teddy Bear Cholla

This bundle of spines is known as a teddy bear cholla cactus. If you see it silhouetted against the sun, it looks warm and fuzzy, but in reality this is one sharp mutha of a plant. The spines adhere to any surface that so much as brushes up against them, and they are very, very difficult to dislodge. It's so easy to get stuck by these things that the cacti are also known as jumping cholla.

This is not true...not quite. The cactus will not jump up and stick you but if you don't steer well clear of it, you will get stuck somehow. Take it from one who knows. The cactus propagate when a clump falls off the main plant and takes root next door; thus the teddy bears tend to grow in groves, impassable to humans and most...but not all...critters.