All three died this year due to the excessive heat.

I am shocked over the cactus though !

My bother used to live near Tucson. People love their saguaros.

transplanted into the residential environment from the wild. When they are finally dug out, and you see the one spindly taproot they depend on, it’s easy to see that they never really “took” in their new situation.

You can see the wall was built (circa 1940) around it.

many decades ago. But even saguaros have limits as to what they can tolerate. They are more drought tolerant than heat tolerant. Look how well they do when planted in the shadow of a paloverde or similar tree offering filtered shade.

My neighbor who had to have her magnificent old saguaro taken down several years ago cut off young vital arm tips and planted them. They took, and are now transplantable young saguaros! I wish I had known about that when I lost each of mine.

they have widespread shallow roots so they can suck up scarce rainfall fast.

we are losing them more to the excessive heat than actual drouth. their cells can't handle it either. add in a few winter frosts and the tissue damage gets colonized by bacteria and they just sort of liquefy and fall apart.

have had nothing but a disproportionately small, carrot-like, white fleshy tap root with a very few root hairs and nothing else. Maybe a symptom of transplantation with failure to take, but they were each in their new location ~ 25 years.