Growing Native with Petey Mesquitey

The photo is mine and taken from our place looking west toward the Dragoons. I call the photo, “Come to Poppa.”

I first learned this snake as the western hog-nosed snake (Heterodon nasicus). It’s now called the Mexican hog-nosed snake (H. kennerlyi). And this is neat, well at least for me; a snake of my Kentucky youth was the eastern hog-nosed snake (Heterodon platirhinos). It has all the same crazy wonderful behavior as our borderlands species. Back in those olden days I remember folks called it puff adder...

Spotting Wyoming paintbrush (Castilleja linariifolia) with those bright red inflorescences out on that gravelly plain in a thicket of Apache plume was so cool.  Our “what’s going on quest” was a success. Paintbrush is what’s going on! The photos are mine. Do you see the beaks? Pretty cool.      

The distinctive odor of canyon ragweed (Ambrosia ambrosioides) is so Sonoran Desert. Hey, burs in your flip flops is a very Sonoran Desert thing too and some of those burs could be from kissing cousin Ambrosia deltoidea. Oh, I forgot to mention that canyon ragweed has medicinal uses, so you may want to look up its uses. So Sonoran Desert! And the plant list that I was perusing and enjoying was for...

This episode of Growing Native is a rambling reminiscence about amphibians and reptiles. With the monsoon starting up here in the borderlands I think we’re going to be seeing some of those. Yay! The photos are mine. That’s a pile of wonderful field guides. I love the old 1966 Peterson Field by Robert Stebbins. The western duded up Sonoran Desert Toad was the logo of the 1970s Tucson band The Dusty...

The common name Firecracker Bush is a good one for Bouvardia ternifolia with its clusters of glowing scarlet flowers that look like small floral explosions, but it can also be one of the many common names for the plant Russelia equisetiformis. Yikes! Sooo, how about the combination of the flower color and the botanical to give  us Scarlet Bouvardia. That’s a pretty cool common name! And, I forgot...

Some spring time banter about the soaptree yuccas (Yucca elata) and pale wolfberry plants (Lycium pallidum) found in the scruffy grassland surrounding our home near the banks of the Ol’ Guajolote. The photos are mine.  

The little urban park in Tucson where part of this episode takes place has always been nice renewal before hitting the road for the two hour trip home. The rocky hillside described is in the Dragoon Mountains and is pretty good for renewal as well. Shindaggers (Agave schottii) have yellow flowers on a four to five foot tall stalk. It’s quite striking. Oh, and I said that shindaggers sucker and tha...

It’s funny how irritable those relic Parry penstemons from an old roadside hydro seed make me. For goodness sake, why weren’t more regional seeds used in that revegetation job? Short diatribe over. Penstemon species are fun to grow in your personal habitat and seed or plants are readily available. One way or the other you’ll get penstemon volunteers as well. Yay! If you are a beardtongue geek, I r...

Fans of borderlands’ flora will tell you there is nothing better than spotting an interesting plant out the window of your truck as you rumble by and shouting, “What was that? Wait, stop, pull over!” A drive-by turns into a stop and go. The sweetbush (Bebbia juncea) that Marian and I saw on the day described in this episode was in rocky desert with lots of mesquite, acacia, tar bush and sumac. Swe...

I love following drainages out of the mountains and across the deserts, observing all the plants and animals that follow them as well. Do I always tell you that? Having wild turkeys come out of the nearby mountains and wander by our little homestead reminded me about the magic of canyons and arroyos that cross our deserts. The reintroduction of the Gould’s turkey into the mountain ranges of southe...

I like to say the name Phlox. I think it’s the letters p, h and l that make it fun, and yes, it’s probably just me. The name is from the Greek for flame and the specific epithet nana for the plant in this episode is also from the Greek and means dwarf. With that in mind, I suggest a common name for Phlox nana could be Little Phlame Phlox. Yay, and you’re welcome! Oh, and those are my notes rustlin...

The plant Dichelostemma capitatum (synonym Dipterostemon capitatus) has at least two subspecies and is found all over the west. For me this lily-like plant announces spring in the desert and uplands. Marian and I felt so lucky to catch the emergence of hundreds and hundreds of Bluedicks in that oak woodland. The Penstemon species we saw were pretty cool as well, so I’ve included the photos I took...

Initially the two Arizona state tree palo verdes were the genus Cercidium. That’s the way I learned them and that’s the genus name you’ll find in all the older floras and field guides. Well, not that older, and anyway, Parkinsonia (the Linnaeus name) was the genus of just the Mexican palo verde, Parkinsonia aculeata. Sometime in the 1980s — I think, I dunno, feeling older— when it was realized tha...

If it wasn’t for the Gadsden Purchase, coral bean or Erythrina flabelliformis wouldn’t be found in southeastern Arizona or southwestern New Mexico and so we are in its northern most range out of Mexico. It has so much to love…amazing bright red flowers on naked branches followed by fan shape green leaves (flabelliformis!) and then the long pods that dry and dehisce and dangle to display the red se...

Ms. Mesquitey and I like the idea of regional crayons. The colors of your home place, of your own biotic community. When we saw the fairy dusters (Calliandra eriophylla) blooming on that rocky slope we realized that maybe it would need a few different crayons. Yay! I don’t know it this interests you, but fairy duster is pretty easy to grow from seed. You just need to get the little bean pods befor...

Brittlebush, (Encelia farinosa) loves rocky hillsides and gravelly desert. And though this native shrub has a large range showing up in the Mojave and Great Basin Deserts, for me the bright yellow flowers atop the silvery foliage shout, “Sonoran Desert!” If you’re interested in ethnobotany (why wouldn’t you be?) this is a good plant to add to your journal with its many uses, from chewing gum to in...

A spring wildflower in the primrose family Onagraceae, Oenothera primiveris is always a delightful surprise in our yard. And thank you Carl Linnaeus for the confusing generic name Oenothera. Jeez! I’ve come across quite a few interpretations of the meaning and I liked this sentence I found in my search; “It’s etymology is uncertain.” I’ll say! I did like the meaning I found in California Flora by...

I was wondering if I talk about dock (Rumex hymenosepalus) every spring, so I looked though my notes. Well, not every spring, but almost. If you’re interested in Rumex in an ethnobotanical sorta way, here is a good place to start your research: Food Plants of the Sonoran Desert by Wendy Hodgson. The photos are mine. I didn’t have a good pic of the red stalk shooting out of the large wavy green lea...

When I sat down to put this episode together I thought it was going to be about the flatheaded wood borers I find when I’m splitting fire wood. Somewhere after talking about sauntering around our homestead I wandered off to another topic. Did I even mention wood borers? So gray fox skull it is. I’ll save flatheaded wood borers for another time. Stay tuned! Gray foxes (Urocyon cinereoargenteus) hav...

The photos are mine and taken in my office, Books and Bones.

Twenty-five or thirty years ago I learned the scientific name of this butterfly as Adelpha bredowii. Then the sister butterfly of the Arizona woodlands got listed as Adelpha bredowii ssp. eulalia. Now…ta da…the Arizona Sister is Adelpha eulalia. Yay!  And, eulalia does not mean “you go girl.” The specific epithet is from the Greek: eu means good and lalia means conversation, so…a good conversation...

The clearing of land, of biotic communities, feels like a southern Arizona affliction doesn’t it? ” We need a housing development, we need a mine, we need a wall and the desert is in the way.” Jeez… Arizona walnut (Juglans major) is the only native species of walnut in Arizona. The species J. microcarpa is not that far way to the east in New Mexico and Texas. And, there are rumors of little walnut...

After I produced this episode, Marian (Ms. Mesquitey) and I were driving in the desert outside Bisbee, AZ marveling at the silhouettes of viscid acacia (Vachellia vernicosa) and I realized I had written and jabbered about winter silhouettes of many deciduous trees and shrubs several times in the past… ahem, like every winter for over 30 years. Oh well, the outlines of naked branches against a bord...

I love desert honeysuckle (Anisacanthus thurberi). It’s a favorite plant and I think that’s because of seeing it growing and flowering in that arroyo along the road to Gates Pass way back in the olden days. My gosh doesn’t a drive to the Sonoran Desert through Gates Pass sound like fun. I haven’t done that in many years. Please don’t tell me there are strip malls all the way there. That would call...