Plant of the Month
Desert Ironwood
Imagine a world inhabited by creatures with names as wild as Gila monster, chuckwalla, vinagaroon, boojum and devil's claw. Close your eyes, and smell a world filled with the fragrances of night-blooming cactus flowers, sacred datura, and the aromatic oils of creosote bush released into the air after the first summer rains. Listen hard, and hear the distant calls of Cactus Wrens, cicadas, Scaled Quail, Curve-billed Thrashers and spadefoot toads. Then open your eyes again, and see that the world you've entered into is swarming with leafcutter ants, carpenter bees, hummingbirds, and kangaroo rats. From the opening paragraph of A Natural History of the Sonoran Desert, published by the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum.
Many people think of deserts to be barren and largely devoid of life save for a few snakes and cacti. But, as the above passage illustrates, nothing could be further from the truth. The Sonoran Desert is full of life. It is home to, among other things, the beautiful and hardy Desert Ironwood tree (Olneya tesota). These trees can live (if rarely) up to 1,500 years. Desert Ironwood is a crucial link in the chain of vegetation in the desert southwest. Flowers of the tree offer nectar to butterflies, bees and hummingbirds while their seeds offer food for many mammals.
Ironwood is a major nurse tree in much of the Sonoran Desert, providing shade and shelter for other plants that enables young plants of other species to become established in a harsh climate where nightly low temperatures can exceed a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Where they coexist, ironwoods are especially important to establishment of the giant saguaro cactus.
The tree is significant enough that in June of 2000, then President Bill Clinton established the Ironwood Forest National Monument in the Silverbell Mountains northwest of Tucson. This nearly 130,000-acre preserve is home to hundreds of plant species as well as many birds, reptiles and mammals.
Those residing in the Sonoran Desert who are looking for a good native species to add to their personal landscapes, can't do better than choosing one of these trees. While it is a slow growing tree, it is a most important one.