Gorgeous blooms from not so gorgeous plants

I started to call this post "Gorgeous blooms from ugly plants," but I didn't want to speak harshly of the native plants and cacti found in the Desert Southwest.  Just like a mother who thinks all of her children are beautiful, I also love all of my plants.  It's just that some of them are a little hard to appreciate until they burst into bloom.

Last weekend found me at the Florafest Native Plant Sale, a fundraiser for the museum at the University of Texas at El Paso.  Many of the plants sold there were native to our region or at least had a good chance of thriving locally.  No prissy plants were allowed!

I often chuckle when I see colorful annuals displayed by home improvement stores at the first hint of warm weather. An  Arizona writer ( Yard Full of Sun)  compared those kinds of annuals to, shall I say using a more polite term, streetwalkers. The Florafest plants weren't pretty or seductive at first glance, so buyers had to understand their potential or be willing to take a risk.  I  took the bait and filled up my Radio Flyer red wagon with many new, exciting species.

My new plants aren't in bloom yet, but I decided to walk around our property and take pictures of plants that have transformed themselves from ugly ducklings into beautiful swans recently by putting on attractive flowers.

Chocolate flower

My husband asked me recently if there was a weed growing in this pot in the courtyard.. Certainly not..  It is a chocolate flower, so called because the yellow flowers, especially in early morning, have the wonderful scent of chocolate.

  

We have a long flower bed by the swimming pool where my husband sowed two packages of wildflower seeds several years ago.  I don't even bother to weed the bed, because the wildflowers themselves look like weeds until they bloom.

Wildflower

Prickly pear blossom

Prickly pear cacti are scary plants. Beware of the large thorns on this variety. But what unusual colors their flowers come in.  This bloom is a peachy-yellow color.

The color of the blooms on this hedgehog cactus half buried in dried mesquite leaves amazed me one morning as I was bringing in the morning newspaper.

Hedgehog cactus

Ocotillos are sneaky plants.  Just when you are about to pull them up because they look dead, they burst into bloom.  Compare these two ocotillo plants from our front yard.

Ocotillo with no leaves or blossoms.  Is it dead?

Ocotillo with small green leaves and red blooms

This final plant  I (ahem) appropriated from a vacant lot in our neighborhood.  Imagine my delight to find it in bloom with pale yellow flowers several months after installation in a bump out area along the front sidewalk.

Orphan plant

Native plants are relatively easy to care for and can survive a little neglect ( I hate it when plants are described as "thriving on neglect."  What living thing could do that ?).  Native plant owners also don't have to huff and puff hauling the plants in and out of the house for the changing seasons. And oh those wonderful, surprising, brilliant, colorful blooms!  .