146 



THE DESERT 



Abnormal 

 colors. 



Blossoms 

 and flowers. 



conditions that dwarf form perhaps enhance 

 color by distorting it in an analogous manner. 

 When plants are starved for water and grow in 

 thin poor soil they often put on colors that are 

 abnormal, even unhealthy. Because of starva- 

 tion perhaps the little green of the desert is a 

 sallow green ; and for the same reason the lobes 

 of the prickly pear are pale-green, dull yellow, 

 sad pink or livid mauve. The prickly pear 

 seems to take all colors dependent upon the 

 poverty, or the mineral character, of the ground 

 where it grows. In that respect perhaps it is 

 influenced in the same way as the parti-colored 

 hydrangea of the eastern dooryard. 



All the cacti are brilliant in the flowers they 

 bear. The top of the bisnaga in summer is at 

 first a mass of yellow, then bright orange, finally 

 dark red. The sahuaro bears a purple flower, 

 and the cholla, the ocatilla, the pitahaya come 

 along with pink or gold or red or blue flowers. 

 And again all the bushes and trees in summer 

 put forth showers of color graceful masses of 

 petaled cups that look more like flowers grown 

 in a meadow than blossoms grown on a tree. 

 In June the palo verde is a great ball of yellow- 

 gold, but there is a variety of it with a blue- 

 green bark that grows a blossom almost like an 



