Flora in Arizona

Saguaro cactus at the Boulders, AZ

I took a trip to Arizona at the end of March, and stayed most of the time at the resort called 'The Boulders' in Carefree, Arizona. It's taken some time to sort through stuff and figure out what to write about.

I love taking pictures of plants in bloom and this trip was no different.  I saw some very pretty things.  The only thing I wished was that I would have left a couple of days later because some of the stuff was just really starting to look pretty.  I was happy seeing what I did get to see.

So here's some of the plants I saw in the Sonoran desert.  I went to Wikipedia to find out more about them under this link on the   Sonoran_Desert#Flora.

I need to put a caveat here - I've spent very little time in the dessert and am not very familiar with the fauna there.  I'm trying to put names on things, but my memory is fuzzy about a lot of stuff.  This will give me something to muse upon while I sit in my backyard. If you can help me I will appreciate it very much.

When I think of the Sonoran desert I think of these Saguaro cacti

Saguaro cactus

 Looking at a Saguaro Cactus from a balloon

Saquaro cactus

When you look at this one look at the wholes that are in it.  There is a group of birds that like to make their homes in these cactus.

There are a lot of different other types of cacti other than the Saguaro cactus.

Cactus Pear

 This one I knew.  Its a Cactus_pear

prickly pear

I wasn't sure if the two above were one and the same so here's the connection to the prickly pear .
  Also in that dessert are  beaver tail beaver tail cacti, but I don't think this was it.

 

 Chollas

I'm not positive about the Chollas but it was mentioned as a plant that is native in the Sonoran dessert.

Fishhook cactus

This looked like a  Fishhook cactus to me.  I thought this was a flower on top but it looks more like its fruit.

Barrel cactus

Hedgehog cactus?

Hedgehog cactus?

 

Yucca

Roses

I wasn't sure if this and the next photo were  Melampodium but that was the only thing that would they looked like the problem was the centers were not yellow in color like they should have been.

Mesquite??

Here's the Mesquite  link

Mexican Heather??
Mexican_Heather link

Salvia or Sage?/

Here's the Salvia link.

I think these are possible   desert sunflowersdesert sunflowers

desert sunflowers

 The next two I don't have much of a clue as to what they are.

 It kinda reminds me of mimosas and I wonder if it is not related to it. Here's the Mimosa link

This last one I couldn't figure out at all.  But I still thought it was a pretty orange bush. 

And the next two photos, I wanted to include them because I liked them.

This one because I felt sorry for the poor cactus being hit by balls.

 I'm having a lot of problems with this post.  So I am going to end it now.