Friday, February 28, 2014

Early Desert Wildflowers


Brittlebush clumps, with their lemony yellow daisy-like blossoms, are the harbingers of an early wildflower season in southern Arizona. This clump, photographed against a wall, is at the height of blooming.

One weather app on my mobile phone shows that the Tucson area has had 0.02 inches of rainfall so far this year. That's not a lot of rain, so the big storm front that is approaching from the Pacific will be welcome this weekend.

So, why are the wildflowers starting to bloom, you ask? The local paper says that above average temperatures in February coupled with fall rains are bringing on the early flowers.

Brittlebushes seem to come first. Some years there are sections of Interstate 10 between Phoenix and Tucson that are yellow with brittlebushes along the roadway.


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