Maybe why I don't grow many spiny plants

[williamsii823]

Next time you are digging a spine or glochid out of your finger, think of this story, and feel better.
About 35 years ago, I was working, as part of a crew, on this estate caring for several greenhouses. Three Orchid houses, a Rose house, a cutting flower house, and a propagation house for starting landscape plants and vegetables, and a Cactus house.
This was before the days of shade cloth, and greenhouses were shaded by spraying a mixture of white paint and water on the roof and sides. Well, I'm on the roof of the cactus house, spraying the shading with a hose connected to a pump on the ground. The roof was made of 5 gables, like ^^^^^. I'm between a set of ^^, and get tripped up in the hose. I fall backward, through the glass, about 10 feet, and landed on my back, on top of all these cactus. I was conscious, but, couldn't move. I had very long hair, tied up, which helped protect my head and neck from many spines. But, I was impaled from my neck to my feet! My leather boots protected my feet. The Emergency Techs, and other workers, had to lift me off of the cactus, and lay me face down for the ambulance ride to the hospital. It took two nurses about 6 hours to get most of the spines out of my back, legs, and butt. They had to cut my clothes off. And used hemostats and tweezers to pull out the spines. They kept spraying me down with a topical anesthetic, and shot me up with pain killer, but it was still quite painful. I was finding the odd spine or glochid here and there for months after.
So, maybe it isn't so bad, digging that one spine out.
But, to this day, I'm more of a succulent guy, than a cactus guy.

[mmcavall]

wow...that sounds painful! but at least you do not fear handling cacti anymore: the worst thing have already happened, and anything that may happens will be nothing compared to that...

[graffiti]

This is pretty much exactly why I stay away from Chollas.

[Tedi]

Some Opuntia and echinopsis spines are pretty nasty.