Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
FIGURE 27.2
Entry garden at Swaback Partners Studio Offices in Scottsdale, Arizona. No imported palette can compare with
the beauty of native trees, shrubs, and grasses of the desert Southwest.
decades ago, desert plants were not to be found in our nurseries. It was common for those
who moved to the desert to treat the land as a blank slate, waiting to be made over in the
image of wherever they came from. Pioneering nurserymen who began nurturing indig-
enous plants were thought to be growing weeds (Figure 27.2).
We have come a long way in understanding the value of desert trees and shrubs. Desert
plants are now protected by ordinance, and restoration procedures have been developed
to a high art. Palo verde (
Cercidium florida),
), palo brea (
Cercidium praecox
), and mesquite
(
Prosopis
spp.) trees surround single-family dwellings and have become a welcomed fea-
ture in highly urbanized areas.
The use of desert plants has expanded beyond the prickly varieties to those that pro-
vide year-round color, all attracting the sights and sounds of birds. No imported palette
can compare with the beauty of native trees, shrubs, and grasses (Figure 27.3). Mexican
poppies (
Eschscholzia californica
) and honeysuckle (
Anisacanthus thurberi
), globe mallow
(
Sphaeralcea ambigua
), gallardia daisies (
Gaillardia aristata
), and penstemons (
Penstemmon
spp.) provide richly varied forms and colors. Add ocotillo (
Fouquieria
), saguaros (
Carnegia
),
and prickly pear (
Opuntia
) and the indigenous variety produces a far richer environment
than any less appropriate landscape could hope to achieve (see Livingston, this volume).
Plants that have been adapted to the Mojave (Las Vegas) and Chihuahuan (Albuquerque)
deserts include native mesquite (
Prosopis
), apache plume (
Fallugia paradoxa
), deergrass
(
Muhlenbergia rigens
), bear grass (
Xerophyllum tenax
), candellia (
Euphorbia antisyphilitica
),
and claret cup hedgehog (
Echinocereus triglochidiatus
var.
melanacanthus
).
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