Part 5

A showy plant with a large terminal cluster of four-petaled flowers, it is frequently called “desert wallflower.” When growing under shrubs it often extends its stems 2 feet or more to reach up into the sunshine. Usually blossoming in March, some plants may be found blooming at almost any time during the summer to as late as September.

Erysimum capitatum Mustard family

26. False-mesquite

With mimosa-like leaves and long-stamened flowers growing in clusters, false-mesquite, “calliandra,” or “fairy duster” is a small, straggling bush, quite Japanesy in appearance, from a few inches to 3 feet high. It blossoms from February to May, and is quite common below 5,000 feet from west Texas to southern California and northern Mexico. In California it is especially abundant along the east side of the Chocolate Mountains. During periods of drought the leaves enter a state of continued wilt, but revive promptly when rain comes.

Calliandra eriophylla Pea Family

27. Catclaw-acacia

Also known by such descriptive names as “tear-blanket” and “wait-a-minute,” catclaw acacia is one of the notoriously thorny shrubs or small slender trees of the rocky hillsides and borders of desert washes. Flowers are fragrant and, during the blooming period in May, attract many insects, including honey bees, which gather and store nectar that makes high quality honey. The stringbean-like fruits turn red in late summer and, if abundant, make a spectacular show. These fruits were ground into meal and used for food by Arizona and Mexican Indians. Thickets of catclaw acacia provide havens of refuge for birds and rabbits pursued by hawks or other predators.

Acacia greggii Pea Family

28. Mescat-acacia

Armed with long, slender, straight white spines, giving it the name “white-thorn,” this pretty flowering shrub is abundant over large areas of dry slopes and mesas from Texas to Arizona and Mexico at 2,300 to 5,000 feet. It is often used as a decorative in landscape plantings around buildings. Blossoms are fragrant and sometimes continue from May to August; the shrub occasionally blooming again in November. Cattle and horses eat the bean-like fruits.

Acacia constricta Pea Family

29. Honey mesquite

Mesquite (mess-KEET) is a many-branched tree 15 to 23 feet tall, which flowers from late April to June. It is common bordering desert washes, often forming dense thickets. The flowers furnish honey bees and other insects with nectar, and the long, sweet pods ripen in autumn, providing food for livestock. The fruits have long been a staple in the diet of desert Indians, who used the trunks, roots, and branches of the trees for firewood and the dried gum-like sap to mend pottery and as a black dye. The inner bark provided the Indians with materials for basketry and coarse fabrics. Roots of mesquite trees have been reported to penetrate to a depth of 50 to 60 feet to tap sources of ground water.

Prosopis juliflora Pea Family

30. Senna

Blossoming from April to October, this species is common at elevations between 1,000 and 3,000 feet Nevada to New Mexico, Arizona, California, and northwestern Mexico. There are fifteen or more other species, many of which are found in a desert habitat and range in size from low-growing herbs to small shrubs 3-5 feet high. Senna is sometimes called “rattlebox” because the nearly ripe seeds rattle in their woody pods when the plant is stirred, startling the hiker who immediately thinks “rattlesnake!” A closely related species, leptocarpa, is noted for its foul-smelling foliage.

Cassia covesii Pea Family

31. Blue palo-verde

Perhaps the most dependable of spring bloomers, blue palo-verde trees cover themselves with masses of yellow blossoms in April and May. Usually found alongside desert washes, they mark these ephemeral stream courses as paths of gold threading the open desert. During much of the year the trees are relatively leafless, the green bark of trunk and branches taking over the function of leaves. The word palo-verde (PAH-low-VEHR-dee) means “green stick” in Spanish, referring to the color of the bark.

Cercidium floridum Pea Family

32. Bird-of-Paradise-flower

Not a southwestern desert native, this striking shrub, 3 to 10 feet high, was introduced from South America and has escaped from cultivation to establish itself in parts of the desert where conditions are suitable. The blossoms are showy but ill-smelling, and are popular as ornamentals about homes, especially in Mexico. The shrub’s principal advantage in landscape plantings is its long blossoming period, which sometimes lasts from April to September.

Caesalpinia gilliesii Pea Family

33. Lupine

This is but one of many species of lupine, both annual and perennial, common throughout the West at nearly all elevations. Perhaps the most publicized is the “Texas” lupine, or “bluebonnet,” hailed by Texans as their State flower. Desert species are early bloomers, sometimes appearing in protected sandy soils and on highway shoulders in January. In favorable seasons masses of these handsome blue to violet blossoms color desert hillsides with acres of fragrant bloom. Sometimes growing in pure stands, often mixed with a variety of other spring flowers, lupines may usually be found blossoming as late as June.

Lupinus sparsiflorus Pea Family

34. Adonis lupine

Considered one of the more handsome of the desert perennials, the “adonis” lupine, as it is known in southern California, is found near sandy washes in the high desert. It is especially abundant in Joshua Tree National Monument. The name adonis refers to its great beauty. The name lupinus is derived from the Latin lupus meaning wolf, because these plants were at one time thought to be soil predators. Actually, as with other members of the pea family, lupines are able to take atmospheric nitrogen and leave it in the ground, thereby increasing rather than depleting soil fertility.