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A fact from a 1973 desert plant survey threw my whole garden plan off
I was reading through old government documents from the Bureau of Land Management online a few weeks ago, looking up native grasses for my backyard in Tucson. This one survey from 1973 said saguaro cacti only grow an inch in their first ten years under natural conditions. That blew my mind because I had been trying to speed up growth on a little one I bought from a nursery, watering it twice a week like it was a tomato plant. Turns out that extra water can rot the roots and set it back even more. I checked with a guy at the local extension office and he confirmed it, said most people kill their saguaro seedlings with kindness. Has anyone else run into old research that totally changed how they care for something common?
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