Tunas and the nopal — the cactus described in the Indies and now farmed in the dry half of the world

Oviedo devotes a chapter of book VIII to the tunas: the fruit sold daily in the plaza of Santo Domingo, the pads used to top the walls of yards and orchards, and the day in 1515 when he ate them and believed he was passing blood. Acosta separates the tunal grown for fruit from the tunal grown for cochineal. Both are read here from the page, next to the modern agronomy that made the plant a dryland crop — and the invasion record that puts Spain among the three countries worst overrun by cacti.