Desert Garden

Another highlight of our vacation was a visit to a cactus garden. It was here that I got the pics of the roadrunner (see Bismarck Birding blog). The sheer variety of desert plants was amazing. While the barrel cacti are still my personal favorites, there are many other succulents and woody plants that are adapted to the desert. And if climate change continues, who knows we might all need to start becoming proficient at growing desert plants in our gardens in Arkansas. I know these guys would be right at home in my backyard this week.

The old familiar "prickly pears." I can remember fighting these guys in the DeRoche church yard. A needle through the sneakers and into the foot was a constant reminder of their presences while I was mowing sections of the yard.

I didn't get the name of this species, but judging from the flower I would say it is a close relative of our Silk (a.k.a Mimosa) tree.

What crazy shapes these cacti take! They almost look like human sculptures.

The Mesquite trees were the largests plants in the garden. However, by comparison to our pines and oaks, these mesquites can look like bushes. The truly amazing thing about these trees is their ability to find water. Mequite trees can put down roots more than 100' deep in order to find water. No other plant comes close to that root depth.

This pot full of "mother-in-law's tongue" was actually on the street rather than in the garden. But just the huge size of the plant caught my eye (4' tall). If you ever saw or felt the serrated edge of its leaf and you are married, then you know how it got its name.

Here is an Ephedra plant. Extracts from this plant have been used and are still being used today for many different things. Ephedrine and psuedoephedrine are the active constituents of this plant.

Here is agave plant is also known as a century plant because it only blooms once in its lifetime, which was believed to be 100 years, but is actually about 25 years. So I guess it should be called a "quarter of a century" plant. When it does bloom the flower is full of very sweet nectar and companies are manufacturing a sugar substitute from the bloom and flesh of this plant.

Aloe is a genus that contains over 400 species. We are most familiar with the species Aloe vera. Here is a field full of what they call "medical" Aloe or Aloe vera.