Cool Water Pipe in Agua Fria National Monument

Less than an hour north of Phoenix, cool water flows through Agua Fria National Monument in a deep canyon that winds from north to south through the desert landscape. Literature on this Monument, which was designated in 2000 by President bill Clinton, touts the importance of preserving prehistoric remains of Ancient Puebloans scattered throughout the windswept mesas.

We were surprised to find equally fascinating historic features on a recent hike through the canyon from Badger Spring trailhead to Sunset Point. Our guidebook, nor the maps and websites about the Monument, made no mention of the ~2-mile long 16" diameter pipeline that spans both sides of the canyon, crossing at one point via a timber brace perched on top of a granite pinnacle. Dozens of dry-stacked stone pillars support the pipe. Where there was not enough flat ground to work with, the pipe is suspended from cliffs by thick cables. This major engineering feat was accomplished for the benefit of providing water and power to the Richinbar Mine, which churned out gold and silver ore for more than 40 years, 1896-1937. The rusted remains of the pumps and a generating station are scattered below the rim near the old town site of Richinbar, currently a private inholding in the Monument, where about a hundred people made a living over a century ago.

Deep history is equally stunning. Strewn throughout the perennial stream, there are giant water-polished granite boulders filled with chunks of even older basalt.

The hike is a strenuous 10-mile boulder hopping adventure, but well worth the journey, especially on a warm day in the desert when wading and swimming in the many deep pools would be pure pleasure.

Wild Pennywort

A year ago, I wrote a short blog about Pennywort after sampling a drink I bought at a local Asian market. Pennywort showed up in my world again a few weeks ago during a visit to Tres Rios Wetlands in south Phoenix, where white pelicans and great blue herons are some of the many charismatic avian residents. To my surprise, one of the dominant plants floating around the edges of the ponds there is a close relative of the popular edible and medicinal Pennywort, also known as Gotu Kola in medicinal plant lore. Even more surprising, this species seems to be relatively new to Arizona! Here is what I've learned so far:

Hydrocotyle umbellata, commonly known as Manyflower Marsh Pennywort, is an aquatic emergent that grows in slow moving water, marshes, ponds and in some regions, lawns.  The plant is broadly established in southern California and in Texas, as well as throughout the southeastern and eastern states up to Nova Scotia, Canada. Large populations are growing in ditches and ponds at City of Phoenix Tres Rios Wetlands, a managed wetland project that uses treated effluent from the nearby 91st Avenue Wastewater Treatment Plant. The bright green floating mats of Pennywort leaves are clearly visible in recent images on Google Earth.

Previously collected specimens near this site and at the City of Phoenix Rio Salado Habitat Restoration Area demonstration wetlands, about ten miles east of Tres Rios, were incorrectly identified as Hydrocotyle verticillata, a closely related species. The two species are most easily distinguished by the the different kinds of flowering stalks: H. umbellata has "umbels," shaped like tiny umbrellas; H. verticillata has "verticels," which are vertically arranged on a slender spike. Both species have round, glossy, peltate (like a lily pad), leaves with ruffled edges. The plant spreads from submerged stems rooted in mud to create extensive floating mats along edges of ponds at Tres Rios wetlands.
















No one is certain how it so recently appeared in Arizona, although it could have been here all along and nobody noticed. This is unlikely, however, since botanists have been scrutinizing the region for more than one hundred years. More likely, the plant may have been introduced as part of wetland restoration efforts along the Salt River. It is also possible that Pennywort was introduced by migratory birds that carry mud and seeds on their feet.

Keep your eyes peeled for other populations of this charismatic and opportunistic wetland species!
Like the Asian Pennywort, this one is also edible and may even increase your memory skills.

Bebida de Pennywort

Feeling adventurous in an Asian market the other day, I decided that I would buy one thing completely foreign to me and give it a try. Having adopted a vegetarian diet about a decade ago made my choices a bit easier. I passed by the stacks of fish sauce, ogled at the  gruesome display of pork uteri, pork bungs (slang for rectum) and other assorted animal parts, and wondered about what it took to harvest the creatures now filling freezers packed with squid rings and frog legs.

Overcome with thirst, I contemplated choices in the canned drink display: Mangosteen or white fungus drink? Coconut or guava? The latter two have long been adopted into the standard line of American refreshments, so I reached for a cheerfully illustrated can of Pennywort Drink, aka Nuac Rau Ma in Vietnamese. Back home, I poured the beverage into a wine glass, held it up to the light, whiffed and swished. This brand looked and smelled a lot like bong water to me. Having never actually drank bong water, I cannot compare the taste, but it was sickeningly sweet. Sugar, it seems, was the main ingredient.

However, I was intrigued to learn that Pennywort (Centella asiatica) is more commonly offered as a medicinal herb in the U.S., usually referred to as Gotu Kola.  Gotu kola is a Hindi name for the herb, a common ingredient in memory enhancing tonics and pills. In the Indian tradition of Ayurvedic medicine, Gotu Kola is revered as a spiritually beneficial plant, aiding in meditation and therefore attainment of enlightened states of mind. As with many herbal remedies, the curative powers of Gotu Kola are legendary, used to treat everything from wounds to male impotence, as well as neurological disorders.

The plant grows wild in wetlands and is especially common in sewage ditches throughout southeast Asia. This does nothing to calm my mind, knowing that toilet facilities are often coincident with roadside ditches in Asia, so after a few delicate sips, I tossed the brew. Next time, I'll go for the mangosteen juice.

The Yum Approach

“There are only two mantras, yum and yuck; mine is yum.”                                                                -Tom Robbins

On a visit to the Seattle area back in August, we were fortunate to arrive in the middle of peak blackberry season. We took the "yum approach" to dealing with the thorny hedges that armor every roadside around Puget Sound, stopping to feast on fruit and gather enough to bake a pie. As we munched, it was easy to imagine the edenic world based on the virtues of berries and briars advocated by Bernard Mickey Wrangle in Tom Robbins' treatise to Rubus armeniacus in "Still Life With Woodpecker." Plenty of food to feed the masses and brew sweet wine; shelter from the elements provided by arches of sturdy stems and broad leaves; elegant dusky-hued light filtering through the bowers; blackberries for biofuel; a natural thorny defense system.  Although the plant is considered a "yucky" noxious invasive weed in the region, even vegetation management agencies have surrendered to these vigorous vines, and no longer require landowners to exercise any attempt to control them. 

Plants like these make me think that perhaps the species we label as pests are the ones we need the most. 

24 Carats

Weighing about 200 milligrams each, the seeds of a Carob Tree (Ceratonia siliqua) have been used as a unit of mass for hundreds of years, and also became an expression of purity for certain mineral alloys.  Today we use finer measures for gems and minerals, but no jewel could have been more precious than the tree that bore these seeds. Providing shade, lumber, food and fodder, a single carob tree would have been a valuable asset in anyone's territory, especially if it was a female tree.  Carobs are "dioecious," meaning that an individual is either a pollen-bearing "male" or a seedpod-bearing "female."

A large Carob tree in central Phoenix

Carobs were imported from the Mediterranean region as ornamental trees and are common in older neighborhoods of the Phoenix metro area. They bloom during the winter months here, producing long (4-6") catkins with small green "female" flowers that look like tiny elephant trunks. Male flowers are star-shaped with five simple stamens. Both kinds of flowers release a slightly putrid aroma that serves to attract pollinators. In order to produce seedpods, pollinators need to navigate from a male tree to a female tree with a full load of pollen.

Carob pod, female catkin & male catkin

Another name for carob is "locust," a common term for many kinds of trees in the bean family. It was the seed pods of the locust tree, not insects, that are referred to in the Bible as a source of food, also known as St. John's bread:
"….and his meat was locusts and wild honey." Matthew 3:4
"And he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate…" Luke 15:16

The pods are the source for sweet edible flour that has been concocted into products marketed as a chocolate substitute. But any discerning chocolate gourmand knows that these efforts generally result in nothing resembling chocolate except in color, and is best left to swine.

Carob leaves and catkins

A is for Asphodel

"Others in Elysian valleys dwell,

Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel."

-from The Lotos-Eaters by Lord Alfred Tennyson

While botanizing at the Phoenix Sonoran Preserve recently, we spotted a strange plant thriving in a shallow muddy basin near the Apache Wash trailhead. About two feet tall and sporting dozens of tiny white, bell-shaped flowers and a rosette of long, thin leaves, it was unlike any I'd seen in this desert before. 

A single specimen of Onion Weed mingles with Sahara Mustard,
Filaree and Globe Mallow in a shallow mud pit.

Long thin leaves of Onion Weed are hollow and slightly succulent.

After a lot of wandering around in plant keys, ranging from the tome of Arizona Flora to local garden center websites, we finally pinpointed this lovely member of the Aloe Family (Xanthorrhoeaceae) as Onion Weed (Asphodelus fistulosus).  This species is a cousin to more than a dozen species of Asphodel, all of which are native to the Mediterranean region.  Onion weed only superficially resembles true onions, and doesn't have an onion smell at all, lacking any noticeable fragrance. The rosette of long, smooth, hollow leaves does remind of onions, garlic, leeks and their relations though, which differ most distinctively in having a globe-shaped flowering head. The family includes many popular ornamental species such as Bulbine and Haworthia, as well as the Aloes. Unfortunately, this species has been dubbed a noxious weed on several continents, including North America and Australia, because it rapidly colonizes disturbed ground and is not palatable to livestock. Large roadside populations are common in southeastern Arizona.

How it got here, far from any other known population, is anybody's guess. Did it arrive on duck feet after monsoon rains created puddles in the desert? Or did it come on the treads of heavy equipment that was used to help transform this patch of desert into a parking lot? Perhaps a sentimental gardener tossed a few seeds by the roadside to see if they would grow. 

However they arrived, the plant has many intriguing ethnobotanical associations. White Asphodel (Asphodelus albus), which is a jumbo version of Onion Weed (growing to about twice times its size with larger (1.5" diam.) flowers), is a legendary plant in Homer's Odyssey and earlier Greek and Egyptian mythologies. Asphodel Meadows represent the ethereal world of the afterlife. Depending on which story you are attracted to, they are the heavenly home, or Elysian fields, of heroes and goddesses, an eternal Eden for ordinary folk, or the fate of unfortunate souls held in limbo at the gateway to the underworld.  

Asphodel plants also serve numerous uses for mortals: leaves and stalks are used to build huts by nomadic tribal people, the Tauregs, in North Africa; edible buds and roots are savored throughout the Meditteranean region; leaves are used for basketry and cheese making in Italy; abundant nectar is transformed by bees into a prized delicate honey. Asphodel also made it into the annals of Harry Potter as an ingredient in a powerful sleeping potion called Drought of Living Death. 

Whether you are fascinated by plant systematics, Greek legend or the intriguing transformations in plant geography wrought by inter-continental trade, Asphodel has something to offer. If nothing else, it's a pleasure to behold and just might become part of your personal paradise. 

Mandala Evolution

Over the past six weeks I've been experimenting with forms and tools to create mandalas, or circular designs, during a 100 Day "Mandala Challenge" started by artists Kathryn Costa and Megan Warren. This may seem like a stretch to relate to suburban natural history, but it does, because ultimately, my images are inspired by forms I find in nature. Today I paused to look at how my drawings had morphed depending on tools I used, color palettes I chose, and the basic shapes that each drawing began with. 

At first I was inspired by a formulaic approach suggested by an accomplished mandala artist who has been practicing mandala art for years, Maga Merlina. This is my very first mandala using a tutorial she posted on her website. Maga Merlina's work continues to amaze me, because for me it is so hard to draw a circle freehand!

Nine days later, my forms, shapes and tools (a set of gel pens and a yellow highlighter) hadn't changed much. I was learning to appreciate  how the mandala drawing practice helped me to focus and to let go of trying to make my drawings "perfect." A little bleed here and a little coloring outside the lines did not matter when looking at the whole.

After three weeks, I started to experiment with incorporating natural forms into the mandala formula. I also invested in a set of graphic artist fine point pens. In this one, I was inspired by a desert marigold flower blooming in my backyard. I decided not to color it because it seemed just right in black and white!

A few days later, I discovered the joy of using brush markers, which changed my color palette quite a bit.  In this one, I was inspired by an evening primrose flower.  

During an on-line Mandala Magic course offered by Scottish artist Julie Gibbons, I learned a new formula based on the patterns of lotus blossoms.   I like this methodological approach because it is very simple, but offers endless variation depending on how you choose to color your design.

By Day 34, I decided to combine the original formulaic approach with the lotus design and a floral center. I also discovered that I really enjoy working with colored pencils, which expanded my color palette dramatically! Still can't draw a circle. :(

Something snapped the next day and I went back to a very basic mandala form, the spiral. This was partly because I was trying to draw while traveling in a car, so it was too bumpy to do anything very detailed. But in the process I realized, my own style was beginning to emerge, which is much more organic. I felt a new sense of freedom and creativity blossoming!

Rapid metamorphosis continued to happen over the next few days.  I created this mandala based on the shape of a thin crescent moon. This was also made while traveling in a car, but I really LIKE the organic, not-at-all "perfect" lines and shapes.

Today, which is day 45 for me, I created a mandala in black ink, colored pencil, water color and metallic marker inspired by the leafy rosette of a winged buckwheat I photographed in Canyonlands, Utah last weekend. 

The entire process fascinates me for so many reasons. It is teaching me better focus, to experiment and to notice patterns in the natural world around me. But it is also teaching me to appreciate how we all evolve in the way we think and do things. Sometimes we change very slowly. Sometimes we have leaps of awareness. Sometimes we combine information from many sources to create new realizations. This is also very much like the process of biological evolution, which combines and recombines genetic material to create new and completely unique lifeforms over the millennia.