Desert Flowers and Fruits

Wolfberry:  Shrubs in this group produce hundreds to thousands of small tubular flowers (left), which then develop into larger, more conspicuous, edible fruits (right) that attract a variety of hungry birds.

Catclaw acacia:  This prickly big shrub flowers (left) heavily in the spring. Some of its flowers become long green fruits (right) after the flowers have been pollinated by insects.  You can see the seeds growing within the pod in this photograph.

Ocotillo:  These tall plants have many thin limbs that grow upward.  At some times of the year, a cluster of bright red tubular flowers (left) grows from the tips of the limbs.  Hummingbirds come to drink the nectar from the flowers and when they do, they may pollinate the flowers, which then become greenish football-shaped fruits (right).

Sacred datura:  This small poisonous shrub has dramatic white flowers (left) that, when pollinated, become equally dramatic spiky fruits (right).

Mistletoe: Here is a parasitic plant that inserts its roots into the limbs of mesquites, paloverdes and ironwood trees in the desert.  It then lives off the sugars produced by the plant it is parasitizing.  At intervals, it produces tiny inconspicuous flowers (left) that grow into larger, bright red, round fruits (right).  A desert bird called the phainopepla likes to eat these fruits. After digesting the edible outer part of the fruit, the bird then passes the seeds out of its gut. If one of these sticky seeds falls onto a tree limb, it can grow a tiny rootlet that slips under the bark, which can lead to a parasitic mistletoe getting started there.

Foothills paloverde:  This common desert tree can, in a good year, cover itself in small white and yellow flowers (left).  Bees visit the flowers for nectar. During their visits, they may transfer pollen from one tree to another, which triggers the development of the fruits of this plant (right).  Each long dangling fruit pod contains one to five plump seeds.

Jojoba:  Another common desert shrub but one with a distinctive approach to reproducing. This is a plant that produces male (pollen-producing) flowers and female (fruit-producing) flowers instead of flowers that combine the two sexes.  Pollen from the little male flowers (on the left) fertilize female flowers that then grow into shiny green fruits (on the right) which contain lots of oil.

Crucifixion thorn:  This plant has many very large and intimidating thorns but its flowers are tiny (left).  If the flowers are pollinated by wasps and flies, they give rise to clusters of reddish fruits (right) that are much more noticeable than the little flowers.