#nyctaginaceae
I have driven past the cemetery in Batesville, TX hundreds of times on my way to and from my hometown, but we never actually stopped there until this month. Bordered by agricultural fields on three sides and US-57 on the fourth, it’s quite packed. The plants are typical of species found on alluvial deposits in this region, and regular mowing favors low-growing species (though the last picture shows guayacan Guaiacum angustifolium, normally a shrub or small tree, stubbornly growing as a mat). Also pictured are scarlet spiderling (Boerhavia coccinea), a normal guayacan with bud, scarlet muskflower (Nyctaginia capitata), Texas bindweed (Convolvulus equitans), and Berlandier’s trumpets (Acleisanthes obtusa).
Boerhavia repens or Alena is a member of Nyctaginaceae better known as the four’o’clock family for the habit of its flowers opening and closing depending on the time of day. This plant is found on all the main Hawaiian islands and many of the less known ones, growing in sandy or rocky soils in coastal areas. As with many plants, native inhabitants found uses for the plant, albeit few, using it mostly as small medicine (e.g. diuretic) and as a famine food.
I initially tried to photograph this plant in the evening, but struggled as the flowers were actively closing enough to cause motion blur in my photos. I gave up and to my surprise found them wide open early the following morning, prompting me to stay locked in my hotel room longer than I had intended. In the end this ended up being one of the plants I found most charming, and only now do I realize the resemblance in its growth to a native California plant I have photographed, Mirabilis laevis, with whom B. repens shares the family. Once I had finished, I brought it back to the native nursery Hui Kū Maoli Ola which had been generous enough to lend some of their plants to me and Hana Hou! for this project.
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Awkward Botanical Sketches #5: Leaves of Yellowstone Edition
Awkward Botanical Sketches #5: Leaves of Yellowstone Edition
Earlier this month, I met up with Eric LoPresti and others at Yellowstone National Park to help take a census of Abronia ammophila, a rare plant endemic to the park and commonly referred to as Yellowstone sand verbena. Abronia (a.k.a. the sand-verbenas) is a small genus of plants in the family Nyctaginaceae that is native to western North America. Several species in the genus have fairly limited…
