Cactus, Texas
6 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1954 and the latest in 1965. It stands in the Dumas census division. It lies in ZIP code area 79013. The Survey maps it on the Cactus West quadrangle. 3,057 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 3,619 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresCactus fell from 3,179 to 3,057 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 3,179 | |
| 2020 | 3,057 | -122 (-4%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
4 surveys from 6 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1954 USGS Dalhart quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1958 USGS Dalhart quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1962 USGS Dalhart quadrangle1:250000
- 1965 USGS Cactus West quadrangle1:24000
Fires near this place
30 since 2006Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 30 fires within 5 miles of Cactus between 2006 and 2018, burning about 122 acres in total. 1 started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 24 |
| Debris and open burning | 4 |
| Natural | 1 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4 August 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | WINNONA |
| 9 July 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | DUTCHER476 |
| 5 July 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | WATER TOWER |
| 6 June 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | PALODURO |
| 6 June 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | PALODURO2 |
| 3 June 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | NORTH 287 |
| 24 June 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | DEBRUCE |
| 24 June 2011 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Texas A & M Forest Service | CITY HALL |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
34 since 1994Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Cactus in 34 storm reports between 1994 and 2024: 21 hail, 12 thunderstorm wind, 1 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2003 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | $45,000 | High winds tore the roof off of a trailer home. |
| March 2000 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | $30,000 | The shop building door was blown off from the Cactus Feed Yard along with windows blown out. |
| June 2006 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | $12,000 | Two grain bins reported to be overturned by the high winds. |
| June 2010 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | $10,000 | Local law enforcement officials reported multiple power lines had blown down...dumpsters were overturned...tree limbs had blown down...a water tank had blown over...shingles had blown off roofs of homes in the area...and a roof had blown off a local business by the strong thunderstorm wind gusts. |
| May 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | $5,000 | A metal roof was blown off one of the apartment buildings at the Cactus JBS apartments. |
| May 2024 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | $4,000 | A three inch diameter tree limb was snapped. A couple of dead or diseased trees were uprooted. One of these trees fell on and damaged a residents chain link fence. |
| May 2023 | Flash Flood | Cactus | - | Torrential rainfall rates of 3 to 5 inches per hour resulted in major street flooding throughout town. Vehicles were stranded with several water rescues being conducted. Some streets had fast flowing water over a foot deep covering the street. |
| June 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | - | Tree limbs, 3 inches in diameter, were blown down along with power poles blown over in Cactus, TX. |
| June 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | - | Spotter had measured the thunderstorm wind gust with a handheld wind meter. |
| June 2018 | Hail | Cactus | - | Had leaves blown from trees. |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | - | Power lines blown down near and on the road along highway 287 just north of Cactus. Time estimated by radar. |
| May 2016 | Hail | Cactus | - | Quarter size hail occurred 2 miles east of Cactus and was reported to be covering Highway 281. |
| August 2009 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | - | A trained spotter estimated thunderstorm wind gusts of fifty-two knots in Cactus. |
| August 2006 | Hail | Cactus | - | Reported at the cotton gin on U.S. Highway 287. |
| June 1994 | Hail | Cactus | - | Evening thunderstorms in northwest Texas panhandle produce baseball-size hail and 60 mph winds. No damage reported with the baseball-size hail. |
| May 2023 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| May 2021 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 2018 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| April 2012 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 2010 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| July 2009 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| March 2007 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| April 2006 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| May 2006 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 2006 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| May 2005 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 2004 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 2004 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| May 2002 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| May 2002 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| September 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 1996 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
| June 1994 | Hail | Cactus | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Etter | 1.8 miles | 6 | |
| Bryden | 3.2 miles | 6 | |
| Sheerin Junction | 6.6 miles | 6 | |
| Machovec | 7.5 miles | 6 | |
| Sheerin | 8.5 miles | 6 | |
| Sunray | 9.7 miles | 6 | |
| Dumas | 13.0 miles | 6 | |
| Stallwitz Lake | 16.7 miles | 6 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Cactus | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q981950 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 1353497. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.



