Natural History Wanderings

Boyce Thompson Arboretum posted this wildflower update on April 1

 New this week – our first Mariposa Lilies are flowering, and Arizona State Parks Volunteer Cass Blodgett spotted Larkspur beginning to bloom in a patch near the highest point on the main trail.

Cactus blossoms worth visiting to see this week include a rare Claret Cup hedgehog Echinocereus triglochidiatus, var. Arizonicus with vivid red flowers easily photographable in the raised bed where the Main Trail crosses Silver King Wash. Native Boyce Thompson Hedgehog cacti named in honor of the parks founder are flowering as you walk the main trail above Ayer Lake.

If you drive Highway 60 east to the Arboretum this week watch for wildflowers that border 20 miles of this scenic highway approaching the gardens from Gold Canyon eastwards – a colorful palette of sky-blue lupine, hot-pink Parrys Penstemon, lemon-yellow globemallow and brittlebush, and feathery pink fairy duster.

Here in our gardens native Sonoran Desert wildflowers began showing back in January – and now there are at least two dozen colorful species to see and photograph along the mile-and-a-half long Main Trail.

HERE AT THE ARBORETUM Camera-ready clumps of Fetid Marigold are trailside immediately as you start down the main trail below the visitor center, then look for vigorous clumps of Wild Rhubarb just past the Smith Building. The Cactus Garden offers the opportunity to compare three blooming lupines Coulters, Bajada & Silver and see Western Dayflower, hot-pink Parrys Penstemon, rattlesnakeweed spurge, and Odora also known as Yerba de Venado, or deer weed.

Watch for Chuparosa near the Boojum Trees, and low thickets of Amsinckia fiddlenecks just below Ayer Lake.Walking past and above AYER LAKE watch for native shrubs such as Mormon Tea and Tomatillo, and trailside patches of Purple Bladderpod, Bluedicks, and Phacelia – the latter with its signature “scorpion tail” curled inforescence.

DOWN ALONG QUEEN CREEK in the shaded riparian area the trail is bordered by thickets of Blue Phacelia Wild Heliotrope, Phacelia distans that will be quite impressive during mid-April. Climbing above are robust vines of Wild Cucumber Marah gilensis snaking up and through jojobas and other unwitting host plants — reaching aggressively skyward with green tendrils and clusters of tiny starfish-shaped white flowers. Its hard to believe all that growth happened in less than one month, and that in another few months these ephemeral vines will begin to dried up, fragment and fall back to the earth – disappearing til next Spring. Monkey flower is a rare find – and you can see these small yellow flowers at the waters edge where the trail is closes to Queen Creek — and narrowest, running between chain-link fence and rock cliff faces. .

EAST OF THE ARBORETUM IN QUEEN CREEK CANYONDrivers who continue past the Arboretum and superior, proceeding another two miles up into Queen Creek Canyon on highway 60 can be rewarded with views of vigorous Stachys Coccinea Red Mint, shown in the photo at left; Tufted Evening primrose, Firecracker Penstemon, Deer Vetch — and the unusual greenish-yellow flowering euphorbia known as Woodland Spurge.

PEACHVILLE MOUNTAIN POPPIES The color is done now, and the flowers gone to seed

To learn more about what is going on at the arboretum and see photos go to: Boyce Thompson Arboretum