We had a really heavy downpour last night. It looks like I’ll have to shore up the front of the property with big rocks to avoid losing more of the landscape. Click on the image for the full sized panorama.
Arizona
Monsoon Evening
We had a pretty good rain shower this afternoon. It quickly came and went without much impact other than raising the humidity in our part of the Sonoran desert to an astounding 65%. Who ever said that Sonoran summers were a DRY heat?
All jesting aside, the rain this summer has brought a badly needed increase to the ground water plane here, regardless of the minor discomfort of a little mugginess. Tonight’s radar weather map indicates a lot of shower activity along the lower Colorado river and north of I-40 in the Kaibab plateau. The Sandia mountains and a lot of new Mexico are also enjoying a rainy evening.
There are a few flash flood warnings in all the heavy rain shower areas.
Carrion Flower
We brought one of our stapelia gigantea plants from California to the Arizona High Desert. I didn’t know if this south African succulent would like the climate here, but apparently it is OK. This is the second flower that opened on this plant since it has been here. The flowers on this plant are smaller than the ones we used to get in California. They also are blooming earlier than the September California blooms.
From Dave’s Garden:
Stapelia gigantea — Interesting succulent, olive green and erect. Lots of branches. 4-sided spineless stems average up to 9 inches and about 1 inch thick. Cactus-like appearance.
Grown mostly for the starfish-shaped flower. Flowers are pale yellow with reddish stripes, covered with white hairs. Flower can average 8 to 12 inches across. It is said to look flesh-like, also reported to have a rotting meat odor, which attracts its main visitor, the fly, for pollinating
This plant which is usually grown in pots is known by several common names which include the following: starfish flower, Zulu-giant, carrion flower and giant toad. It is native to southern Africa and Mozambique.
By the way, Dave’s Garden is one valuable resource when trying to learn about plants and flowers
The Wickenburg Express
I took this photo of the antique AT&SF locomotive and caboose on display on Frontier Street in old downtown. We do live in a picturesque place in the high Sonaran desert in a beautiful and historic little western town. Click on the image to enlarge.
Lawyer’s Tongue Cactus
Lawyer’s Tongue prickly pear cactus is also known as “Cow’s Tongue,” “Donkey Ear” and opuntia engelmannii var. linguiformis. We collected a specimen that was laying on the ground under a larger plant in the wash running through one of the local parks. We placed it in a pot of native soil from our wash last summer. I think it likes it here because it quickly grew two new pads the first year. Now, it is almost time to re-pot it or maybe put it in the ground.
We found WufStuff, a very interesting website that describes this cactus and has a lot of good information about prickly pear cacti in general. Excerpt:
A common sight in Arizona gardens is the Cow’s Tongue Prickly Pear. Folks like this cactus because of the unusual shape of the pads, which strongly resemble a cow’s tongue. It takes little water, and has yellow or orange flowers in the spring that form along the margins of the pads, followed by numerous red fruits.
The cultivating of these cactus requires only that it be planted and left to grow on it’s own, no fertilizer, no watering, nada, nothing. Best grown on land useless for growing corn and other Cattle feed stock. After a year or two, the pads are ready to eat and the fruit is ready to harvest if so desired. After each feeding the cactus is left to grow another meal which happens quite quickly in the desert lands of the Southwest.
Click on the image above to enlarge.
Colorado River Toad
I noticed something moving on the RV drive last evening after some thundershowers. I thought it looked like a frog. We took photos of it while it was climbing up the slope behind the drive.
After a little research this afternoon, we believe it is a Colorado River Toad, a.k.a. Sonoran Desert Toad. It matches the description given in Wikipedia for such toads.
We have long heard that desert toads respond to thunder and come out of their burrows to look for pools in which to spawn. This is our first encounter with a desert toad.
Click on the image to enlarge.
From Wikipedia
The Colorado River toad, Bufo alvarius, also known as the Sonoran Desert toad, is a psychoactive toad found in northern Mexico and the southwestern United States. Its skin and venom contain 5-MeO-DMT and bufotenin.
The Colorado River toad can grow to about 7.5 inches (190 mm) long and is the largest toad in the United States apart from the non-native cane toad (Bufo marinus). It has a smooth, leathery skin and is olive green or mottled brown in color. Just behind the large golden eye with horizontal pupil is a bulging kidney-shaped parotoid gland. Below this is a large circular pale green area which is the tympanum or ear drum. By the corner of the mouth there is a white wart and there are white glands on the legs. All these glands produce toxic secretions. Dogs that have attacked toads have been paralyzed or even killed. Raccoons have learned to pull a toad away from a pond by the back leg, turn it on its back and start feeding on its belly, a strategy that keeps the raccoon well away from the poison glands.
