There is no getting around it, every summer monsoon when the borderlands come to life it is so exciting! Apodanthera undulata, the crazy melon, can be easily seen along the roads and out across the land during this season. The clusters of yellow flowers give it away quickly. Those yellow flowers close up pretty quickly later in the morning. You can see the spent and tired flowers in the photo below. And check out the crazy ribbed fruit with the “disagreeable odor” as noted in Arizona Flora. Hey, it’s melon loco in the Cucurbitaceae! Yay!
When I initially wrote this story I was using Lyman Benson’s The Cactus of Arizona as my reference and the queen of the night...
Petey discusses the predicted rainy weather in song.
Hummingbird trumpet has had quite a few botanical names and I’m still not sure that I got the current botanical right in this episode....
