In a place where the golden sand touched the endless blue sky, there grew a small, round cactus named Piko. He was not alone. An entire family of cacti spread out around him, some as tall as pillars, others branched out like strange candelabras. Piko, however, was the youngest and the most curious. All day long, he watched the hot air shimmer above the desert and the wind race across the dunes, whispering ancient tales.
On one particularly hot afternoon, when the sun baked so fiercely that even the lizards sought shade under the rocks, something small and fuzzy approached Piko. It was a young desert fox with fur the color of sand and eyes like two shiny pebbles. His name was Felix, and he was incredibly thirsty. His tongue hung from his mouth, and every step in the hot sand was a struggle for him.
“Water... please, just a drop of water,” whispered Felix, his gaze falling on Piko’s fresh, green surface. It looked so juicy! It must be full of water. Without a second thought, Felix moved closer and tried to take a bite.
“OW!” he yelped and jumped back. Several of Piko’s sharp spines had stuck into his nose. They were hard and pricked like needles.
“Why are you so mean?” Felix growled, offended, carefully rubbing his sore nose with his paw. “You can see I’m thirsty, and you defend yourself with your needles! You’re no friend at all!”
Piko sighed. It wasn't the first time someone had accused him of being unpleasant and prickly. “I’m not mean, Felix,” he said quietly. “My spines have a very important job.”
“A job?” Felix snorted. “What job can something have that only hurts?”
Just then, from under a nearby dry bush, a slow, wise tortoise named Stella emerged. On her shell, she carried the map of her entire long life. The sun didn't bother her; she knew how to deal with it.
“I hear an argument,” she said in her calm, deep voice. “What’s going on, young friends?”
“This cactus pricked me!” Felix complained. “He wouldn’t give me even a drop of water, even though his belly is surely full of it!”
Stella smiled. “And did you ask him, Felix? Or did you just try to take a piece without permission?”
Felix fell silent and looked down at his paws. He had to admit that he hadn't asked.
“You see,” Stella continued, slowly coming closer. “Piko isn’t mean. He is just very wise and adapted to life here in the desert. Piko, will you explain to us why you have spines instead of leaves?”
Piko felt a little shy, but then he gathered his courage. “A long, long time ago, my great-grandmothers and great-grandfathers had big, wide leaves. Just like the plants in gardens far away from here.”
“And where are those leaves now?” asked Felix curiously, forgetting the pain in his nose.
“The sun,” Piko answered. “Our desert sun here is very strong. It would have drunk all my water from big leaves. It would have simply evaporated into the air. We tried it.”
“Evaporated?” Felix didn’t understand. “What does that mean?”
“Come, I’ll show you,” Stella suggested. She found a piece of a wide, green leaf that the wind had brought from a distant oasis. She placed it on a hot rock next to Piko. “Now, we will watch for a while.”
They sat and waited. Felix shifted impatiently from paw to paw. Piko and Stella calmly watched what would happen. The sun burned and burned. After just a short while, the edges of the leaf began to turn brown. It lost its fresh color, shriveled up, and became smaller and drier. In the end, only a fragile, brittle speck remained.
“Look!” Felix cried out. “It… it dried up! All the water from it is gone!”
“Exactly,” Stella nodded. “The water evaporated from it into the air. Imagine, Felix, if Piko had thousands of big leaves like this one. In a single day, he would be as dry as this little piece.”
“That’s why my leaves changed over thousands of years,” Piko added. “They became these small, hard spines. Almost no water evaporates from them. They are my special leaves that help me save every single drop.”
Felix thought for a moment. “Okay, I understand that. Your spines protect you from the sun. But why are they so sharp? Why did they have to prick me?”
Stella smiled wisely again. “Try to answer that yourself, Felix. What would you do if Piko were green, full of water, and completely smooth, without a single spine?”
The fox hesitated for a moment. He looked at Piko, then at the hot sand, and remembered his immense thirst. “Well… I guess… I guess I would eat him all up right away. And then a camel would come. And after that, a hare. And we would all take a bite until there was nothing left of him.”
When he finished speaking, his eyes widened. Suddenly, he understood everything.
“So… the spines…” he whispered, “they aren’t there to make you mean. They’re there to protect you. So that thirsty animals like me don’t eat you, and so you can survive.”
“Exactly,” Piko said, and there was relief in his voice that someone finally understood him. “I collect water when it rains, once in a long while. My roots, just below the surface of the ground, quickly soak up every drop. Then I have to guard it for months. It is my treasure.”
Felix felt a little ashamed. He had wanted something that didn't belong to him and hadn't even tried to understand why he couldn't have it. “I’m sorry, Piko,” he said sincerely. “I understand now. You’re actually very clever. You’ve figured out a great way to survive in this difficult world.”
Just then, the sky clouded over with a single small cloud, and from it fell a few large, precious drops. One of them landed right on Piko and slid down his green body to his roots, where it instantly soaked into the sand.
Piko was delighted. And because he saw that Felix had truly understood everything, something unexpected happened. At his very top, a beautiful, bright yellow flower bloomed. In its center glistened a single, tiny drop of pure water that the flower had caught.
“Here,” Piko said in a friendly voice. “This little flower is for you. You may drink from it. It is a gift for learning something new.”
Carefully, so as not to touch the spines, Felix licked the tiny drop from the flower. It was the best water he had ever tasted. There wasn't much, but it was enough to quench his worst thirst.
From that day on, Felix and Piko became the best of friends. Felix never tried to eat cacti again. Instead, he learned from Stella to look for shade and wait for the morning dew. And whenever he met Piko, he would always admire his prickly wisdom and beautiful flowers, which were a reward for those who understand the rules of the desert.
And what about you, children? On your next walk, try to notice the different kinds of leaves on the trees and flowers around you. Are some large and others small like needles? Perhaps they too have their own story about how they protect themselves and save water.