Santuario de los Cactus

In 2011, Rande and I drove a rental car from Todos Santos on the Pacific side of southern Baja to Punta Colorado on the Sea of Cortez. Passing through the foothills of the Sierra de la Laguna, we saw a small sign pointing down a dirt road to the “Santuario de los Cactus.” We stopped for a short visit and returned to the cactus sanctuary this year.

El Santuario de los Cactus is 6 km off the Transpeninsular Highway between La Paz and San Jose del Cabo at about KM168. The 6-hectare (15-acre) forest-like sanctuary is surrounded by 50 hectares of protected land in ejido El Rosario, a small village of 25 families in the northern foothills of the Sierra de la Laguna [ejido is communally-owned farmland]. At an elevation of 425 m (1400 ft), the sanctuary is part of the dry forest ecoregion, the transition between the lowland xeric scrub of the southern Baja peninsula and the pine-oak forests of the mountains (link).

UNESCO designated the Sierra la Laguna a global biosphere reserve in 2003; 23% of the nearly 1,000 species found in the sierra are endemics. Human activities within the biosphere reserve include extraction of timber and other forest products, farming and cattle raising (link). 

Road to the cactus sanctuary with Sierra la Laguna in the background

There are approximately 1200 species and 153 genera of cacti in North and South America; 40 percent of the genera occur in Mexico. According to Demetrio, sanctuary caretaker and guide, 100 species of cacti have been identified in the sanctuary and surrounding reserve. The large mesquite trees in the sanctuary are many hundreds of years old and serve as nurse trees to the young cacti.

Cactus sanctuary trail with interpretive sign

Mesquite even act as hosts for young cactus epiphytes.

Cacti as epiphytes on a mesquite tree

The cardón, or elephant cactus, (Pachycereus pringlei) physically dominate the sanctuary. It is the tallest cactus in the world (15-20 m) and lives hundreds of years. Older individuals lose many of their spines and the lower trunks turn gray and develops a woody bark resembling the legs of an elephant (link, link).

Cardón

The organ pipe cactus (Stenocereus thurberi) is known as pitaya dulce for its sweet fruit (link).

Organ pipe cactus with cristate (crest or fan) form

A tree-like Stenocereus