One of my first ranch chores before I do much else is to crank up the Kawasaki Mule 4 x 4 and go check the fence line. A lot can happen in a day much less in a week. Call this “perimeter check” an old habit that harkens back to the days when a couple of head of cattle and several horses roamed a much larger spread than what I now currently traverse at El Mesteño. What I am looking for? Anything, really…. However, some of the things that I am looking for are holes in the fencing, signs of trespassers or travelers (sagging fencing), burrows created by critters under the fencing between my place and neighboring properties, broken strands of old barb wire, feathers, fur, a piece of glinty gum wrapper that is out of place, pull tabs from gallon water jugs, snare traps, and tracks—human, animal, heavy equipment, and vehicle,—just to name a few.
On this particular day, however, something other than any of those aforementioned things caught my eye! It was a scraggly, short little Black Brush (Acacia rigidula) sporting a lovely corsage of creamy, white blooms gently swaying back and forth in the light breeze. It was only about three (3) feet tall, but, foot for foot, it was one of the flashiest things on the place just now! Wow! Has Spring sprung early, is it going to rain, or both?
As I continued on my merry, fence-checking way, I decided to head over and visit the “Belle of the Ball” (Huisachillo Acacia schaffneri) and see if she might be blooming. She was! Hardly a leaf on her spring sundress, yet tiny, delicate, yellow puffs of fragrant blooms were already bursting forth to adorn her bare branches! The color! The perfume! Her spring sundress will eventually be covered with fine, delicate greenery comprised of alternate, twice compound, very narrow leaflets and even more yellow puffs (radial, globose clusters about 3/8″ broad) which will become THE MOST FRAGRANTLY FANTASTIC sundress you will ever both see AND smell.
POPS OF COLOR HERE AND THERE…..
Even the Spanish Dagger, or Palma Pita, (Yucca treculeana), in all of its majestic glory, has been standing at attention, as if guarding the ranch cabin, adorned with lovely flowers that resemble a magnificent, billowy, ivory plume—both greeting and entertaining pollinating visitors at dusk—for the last couple of weeks.
Pincushion Cactus Mammillaria heyderi Spanish Dagger Yucca treculeana
