If you are inclined to be a botanical splitter, then the plant I’m talking about is Condalia warnockii var. kearneyana, or so say Benson and Darrow. I’m a lazy lumper and so the plant is Condalia warnockii or Mexican Crucillo. Around you and me this interesting shrub in the Buckthorn Family ranges from 2,500 to 4,500 feet in elevation, being equally at home in the Sonoran Desert, the Chihuahuan Desert and the Desert Grassland. And I think it would be quite at home in your yard as well.
It was a recent morning of watching mud daubers come and go through our barn door that reminded me of the small wonderful things...
Hummingbird trumpet (Epilobium canum) kicks into bloom in late summer and early fall and the red flowers are spectacular! Until then it sits around...
One of my favorite forests of chain-fruit cholla, also called jumping cholla, was in the desert on the north end of the Tortolita Mountains....
