Kactus Korral Inc., of Harwood brings a splash of color into millions of homes as one of the largest wholesalers of indoor succulents and cactus in the country. You have probably seen some of their products in the nation’s largest retailers, but you can get more than just a peek of the great variety of plants they produce by stopping at the company’s visitor’s center east of Luling.
First of all, that little cactus sold in stores around the country with the stout green stock and the bright red or yellow tops is actually two plants. Kactus Korral specializes in grafting the two plants together to make a plant that is attractive and hearty. “People buy pretty plants,” says Al Jenkins, owner of the wholesale nursery. “Color sells.”
The colored cactus is actually a mutation of nature called a “crest.” Occasionally, a cactus will produce a growth that is unusual in color or shape. These apendages are carefully propagated by grafting it to a host plant that provides the chlorophyll necessary for it to survive. The most common stock plant is a member of the euphorbia family. One of the largest families in the plant world, euphorbia include poinsettias, candelabra euphorbia, and African milk trees.
Crests can be almost any color, size, and shape. Some look like brains; others look like flowers or fuzzy balls. Contrary to urban myths, the crests are not doused in radiation, dyed, or injected with chemicals to give them their spectacular colors or shapes. “I can’t make the crest do anything,” Jenkins says. “It will do what it wants.”
Some of the growths will eventually try to revert back to its natural appearance, while others will be happy to reproduce for generations in the same unique appearance. Jenkins says that it takes a minimum of five years before a crest can be produced in commercial quantities. “We’re always looking for new stock,” he says.
Jenkins was selling used cars in Plano when the oil embargo sent gasoline prices skyrocketing and left him with a bunch of gas guzzlers that nobody wanted. While he was landscaping his own yard he began experimenting with growing desert plants and cactuses.
In 1978, Jenkins merged his plant business with a nursery in Harwood, and Kactus Korral began with six greenhouses. Today, the wholesaler has more than 115 greenhouses that look like giant, white, plastic caterpillars along the highway. The company sells to the largest retailers in the country as well as to neighborhood hardware stores and nurseries.
A visit to the company’s public greenhouse on a hill overlooking the commercial greenhouses gives a clue to the variety of plants that fill the Quonset hutlike buildings. Jenkins grows about 1,500 species of cactuses and succulents, as well as experimenting with tomatoes, lettuce, and other foods. “We don’t use any fertilizers or pesticides on the vegetables,” Jenkins says.
The prices of the plants at the visitor’s center are the same as any retailer, but the variety can be almost overwhelming. There are tall ones, short ones, fat ones, skinny ones; cactuses and succulents of almost every size, shape, and color. All of the plants in the greenhouse are indoor plants; they won’t survive even Texas’ mild winters. The Kactus Korral sells only a few outdoor cactuses.
Visitors are welcome to just look around or to do a little shopping. The store handles a fine selection of pottery to give your cactus an attractive new home. As a sideline, the shop carries hard-to-find period clothing. The clothing business started when Jenkins and his wife were extras in a Western movie and found it difficult to find proper attire.
The Kactus Korral is about 12 miles off of U.S. 183 east of Luling at the intersection of U.S. 90 and FM 304, or about two miles north of I-10. Tours of the greenhouses are limited to groups. Vegetables are sold at the store when in season.
“We have some very interesting plants, lots of room for the kids to get out and roam, and very clean restrooms,” Jenkins says of the visitor’s center. The retail shop opens daily from 8am to 6pm. For more information, call 800/821-5485 or 830/540-4521.
767th in a series. Day Trips, Vol. 2, a book of Day Trips 101-200, is available for $8.95, plus $3.05 for shipping, handling, and tax. Mail to: Day Trips, PO Box 33284, South Austin, TX 78704.
This article appears in February 24 • 2006.
