Living Rootless: Tucson, AZ: Tohono Chul: Flora and Fauna

Wednesday, April 24, 2019

Tucson, AZ: Tohono Chul: Flora and Fauna

Lizard at Tohono Chul Botanical Gardens, Tucson, Arizona. April 2019.

Fauna

I heart desert lizards. They scamper up and down trees and across grounds; they do push ups; they pop out their necks like bubble gum; they move their heads about charmingly. They eat insects. They are relatively polite, not making a mess of one's garden, house, or trash. They are quiet. They are not likely to climb onto you.

There are many lizards at Tohono Chul, just as there are in Tucson generally. On my Easter afternoon visit, I saw a lizard with black and white rings arund its neck and a curly tail - like a Samoyed's curl - with black and white rings at its tip.

Tohono Chul Botanical Gardens, Tucson, Arizona. April 2019.

Flora

The usual assortment of cacti reside at the botanical gardens, of course.

Tohono Chul Botanical Gardens, Tucson, Arizona. April 2019.

So maybe one's eye naturally seeks out that which is a little different, such as how the light passes through a bloom or how it rests on giant seed pods that a tree sloughed to the earth.