cacti Archives - NorthStarNature

Be Like the Wolf Flower

March 6, 2022 by Denise Brake 5 Comments

We are a part of Nature. In light of all that is going on in the world around us, my last post from our Christmas Texas trip reminds me just how strong, tough, scrappy, and resilient the creations of Nature are, including us.

We were introduced to the Texas Sotol plant, used as a drought tolerant landscape plant with its wheel of wondrous spikey green leaves. We saw it in the wild at Pedernales Falls State Park, sitting atop the limestone boulders and sandy soil. But we learned about the history and utility of the plant when we went to Desert Door Texas Sotol distillery on New Year’s Eve in Driftwood, Texas. First off, what an absolutely beautiful place Desert Door is! Stylish southwestern building, captivating landscape and decorating, and beautiful cobalt blue glass bottles holding the premium liquor made from the ‘heart’ of the Sotol plant. Like tequila made from Blue Agaves, the Sotol plant has a pineapple-looking core that stores moisture and carbohydrates. Traditionally, the Sotol hearts were baked in earth ovens for 36-48 hours, and the pulp was formed into patties and dried. It was an important food staple for native peoples. Sotol plants grow by the millions in west Texas and are wild-harvested for Desert Door. They steam cook the Sotol hearts, and the pulp is pressed to release the molasses-like juice. It is fermented with yeast to a Sotol beer, then distilled to make the Sotol liquor.

The tough, toothed leaves were also used by native peoples for woven mats, baskets, rope, thatching, and paper. The tall (10′-15′) flower spikes that attract hummingbirds when blooming were used like wood poles for building—a very utilitarian plant!

Prickly Pear cactus grows in the harshest hot and dry conditions and was also used as a food source. None of the plants offer an easy meal, however. It takes determined, tough people to extract food and drink from these tough, resilient plants.

Ashe Juniper driftwood by the Pedernales River

After leaving Pedernales Falls, we drove to another part of the 5200-acre park. Twin Falls nature trail was rugged over limestone cliffs and through Ashe Juniper forests. I wondered how one would ever ride a horse through this country….Luckily the park has cut miles and miles of equestrian trails through the rough terrain.

Another thorny, scrappy plant is the Tasajillo or Pencil cactus. The beautiful red fruits and the slender green stems are a visual reminder of Christmas, another one of its common names. It is also known as Jumping cactus, because the brittle stems break away from the plant easily when brushed slightly or even by the wind.

We hiked down to Trammell’s crossing where one would have to get wet feet in order to continue on the hiking trail. Time did not permit further hiking for us, so we explored the river bank lined with Bald Cypress trees. Their roots created a barrier to the rushing water of the Pedernales River when flash flooding occurs—stalwart soldiers in the fight against erosion.

Most every plant and tree in the state park and in this area of Texas are tough, resilient creations. They live in arid soil, in drought conditions, in high heat, and in areas where flash flooding tends to wipe things away. But in the heart of Winter grows a delicate looking plant—the Texas Bluebonnet. It goes from seed to flower to seed in one year. The cool season of winter establishes its roots for the growing / blooming season. The Bluebonnet is the state flower of Texas and symbolizes the bravery and sacrifice of the pioneer women (the flowers resemble the bonnets worn by them). The genus name Lupinus is derived from ‘lupus,’ meaning wolf. So the delicate looking foliage belies the true nature of the hardy wildflower—it is beautiful and tough.

Pedernales Falls State Park is a wild tapestry of tough, resilient Ashe Junipers, cacti, sand, limestone boulders, Sotols, Bald Cypresses, and even Bluebonnets. The environmental conditions are rough and tumble. Each has qualities that enable them to live and thrive in such conditions. The Ukrainian people have shown their tenacity and toughness in the face of Russia’s callous war—the conditions are harsh and cruel and feel untenable. And yet, they fight on for their country and for democracy. The human spirit is strong, tough, and scrappy—whether living from the land like the native people did, whether traveling and homesteading on the land like the pioneers did, or enduring a pandemic and fighting or witnessing a brutal war like the modern world has been doing. We are brave. We are tough. We are resilient. We are a part of Nature.

At the Foot of the Rock

February 17, 2019 by Denise Brake 2 Comments

I can see the light of a clear blue morning/ I can see the light of a brand new day/ I can see the light of a clear blue morning/ And everything’s gonna be all right/ It’s gonna be okay –Dolly Parton

There’s something to be said for being able to clearly see what lies before you, what your task is, even what path you will choose. The first time I heard about Enchanted Rock in the Hill Country of Texas was when our daughter Emily worked at The Outdoor School in Marble Falls. It sounded, well, enchanting—a huge dome of granite rock that bubbled up as magma a billion years ago, then slowly began eroding. It is a place that humans have camped at and called home for more than 12,000 years. There are stories and legends of spirits and sacred spaces from explorers and Native Americans and of how the mammoth rock glitters on clear nights with ‘ghost fires.’ I wanted to see it, and I wanted to climb to the top. Enchanted Rock is a small visual part of a huge underground area of granite called a batholith that covers one hundred square miles, so even what is unbelievably large is small compared to what lies unseen below it. The pink granite dome rises 425 feet above the base elevation of the park—like climbing stairs of a thirty to forty story building, and the people at the top looked like ants from our vantage point. Before climbing the granite dome, we explored around the other environments at the base of the rock—the floodplain, Mesquite grassland, and Oak woodland. It had rained the night before, so the shallow creek-bed was flowing with clear water and home to a great-looking snake.

Like all the places we had visited in Texas, I was amazed at how the prickly pear cactus occupied such diverse environments and how some of the trees still wore their green leaves.

One of the unusual sights for me was a ball of green Mistletoe in a bare tree. The tradition of kissing under the Mistletoe began with the ancient Greeks, as the evergreen plant with its shining white berries symbolized fertility. Now it has become a tradition/decoration of the Christmas season. It is a parasitic plant that sends its roots into the wood of a branch and usurps water and nutrients from the tree. A heavy infestation of Mistletoe can cause dying of branches or death of a tree.

Another plant that is sometimes thought to be a parasite is Ball Moss, seen as the gray balls in the Oak trees below. They are actually epiphytes—plants that live on other plants, but absorb water and nutrients through their leaves from the air. These ‘air plants’ anchor themselves to the bark of a tree with tendrils. Some arborists believe the tendrils can strangle a branch, and eventually kill a tree, but it is very common to see a tree full of Ball Moss with their pokey seed pod stalks. ( I like how the Prickly Pears poked their ‘heads’ out of the grass in this picture.)

Yucca plants with their tall stalks of seed pods grow among the Prickly Pears, grasses, and rocks.

In fitting attire for our after-Christmas hike was the colorful fruit of the Desert Christmas Cactus, sometimes called Pencil Cactus because of the slender leaves.

In the millions of years of erosion, exfoliation of layers of rocks has tumbled down the side of the dome into piles at the foot of Enchanted Rock.

Miniature ecosystems form on and below the rocks where moisture is a bit more abundant…

…and where tiny, viney yellow-flowering plants survive in a crack between rocks, perhaps blooming in response to the recent rain.

The ecosystem at the foot of E-Rock is hard and harsh with the masses of granite rocks and cacti, and yet at the same time, there is a softness and flexibility in the flowing water, the swaying grasses, and the carpets of delicate moss that cover the rocks in the floodplain.

This impressive granite rock, with its long history of geological wonder and spiritual acclaim, attracts people to stand at the foot of the rock in awe of what lies before them. There are times in our lives when we stand in such awe looking forward in our lives—at graduations, at weddings, at funerals, at the births of children, and then again when those children leave the nest. What we see at those times is small compared to what lies unseen in the life-altering tasks before us. Perhaps naivete and enthusiasm are the glasses we need to look through in order to propel us through the droughts, the prickly places, and the hard times. Dolly sings about those long, hard nights, the long hard fights, and the “clinging vines that had me bound.” The largest and most enchanting rock that lies before us is not anything that happens in our external world, but that which happens within us. It’s time to explore. It’s time to face the daunting task of noticing the stories and legends we carry in our hearts. It’s time to eradicate the parasitic thoughts that are killing our souls. There’s something to be said for being able to clearly see what lies before you, what your task is, even what path you will choose. And through it all, we look forward to seeing the light of a clear blue morning and a brand new day. Everything’s gonna be all right. It’s gonna be okay.

Hiking with the Newlyweds

November 19, 2015 by Denise Brake 2 Comments

It is not what we have that will make us a great nation; it is the way in which we use it. –Teddy Roosevelt

Cultural remains dating back over 8,000 years have been recovered at an oasis in the Texas Hill Country called Hamilton Pool. A small canyon surrounded by limestone cliffs is home to a jade green pool of water fed by a small creek that tumbles over the natural grotto cliff in a fifty-foot waterfall. Before the 1800’s it was home to Tonkawa and Lipan Apaches. In the mid 1860’s, Morgan Hamilton owned the property and twenty years later sold it to the Reimers, an immigrant family from Germany, who operated a sheep and cattle ranch. They opened the pool to the public, and by the 1960’s and 70’s, it was a popular destination. With grazing and extreme use, the native habitat was suffering, so in 1985, Travis County purchased 232 acres and began an intensive restoration of the area now known as Hamilton Pool Preserve.

We were fortunate to have a few days after the wedding to explore some of the Texas Hill Country. The countryside is arid and hilly with many unfamiliar trees and plants. We began the short hike to Hamilton Pool amidst prickly pear cacti and limestone rocks.

The holly-like leaves of this shrub caught my attention–along with the spider web. After some research, I discovered the shrub is called Agarita (Mahonia trifoliolata). It flowers yellow in the spring and produces red berries that are desirable to birds and small animals and also make a tasty jelly.

We descended the trail with limestone cliffs to our right and towering trees to our left.

We were surprised to see they were bald cypress–deciduous conifers that like their ‘feet’ in water!

Aaron spotted an inhabitant of the cypress grove–a green anole lizard!

The canyon walls rose around us…

we crossed a wooden bridge, skirted over some rocks, and there was the pool! People were swimming and wading in the clear, green water.

Mosses and maidenhair ferns grew on the grotto ceiling, and the constant dripping water created stalactite fountains that cascaded into the pool.

Sunlight reflected off the water onto the rock ceiling, creating a subtle dance of light.

At the back of the shady grotto, on the rocky trail, a shrub grew. It had striking red flowers that resembled a tropical hibiscus, though they were smaller and unopened. The stamen protruded from the petals–a telephone pole for the silky webs of a spider. This shady shrub has common names of red mallow, Turk’s cap, and sleeping hibiscus. It produces an edible fruit that tastes like an apple, thus its Spanish name-Manzanilla (little apple.)

We followed the trail around the pool, then dipped our feet in the cool water while Aaron went for a swim. It was an amazing, lush oasis in the middle of an arid land. It was full of contrasts–from maidenhair ferns to prickly pear cacti, from water-loving cypress trees to desert-like agarita bushes. No wonder it has been a destination of wonder and rest for thousands of years.

We drove a few miles to another part of the old Reimers Ranch that has been turned over to the County for public use. It is a world-class rock climbing destination, has miles of mountain bike trails, and fishing in the Pedernales River. We hiked to one of the rock climbing places, slipping down a rocky stream bed to a large limestone cliff and cave.

Dripping water had formed an ancient stalagmite with an apron of moss and ferns.

I ducked into a cave for an insider’s look.

Spiny gray airplants clung to many of the trees in Texas. Ball Moss is a Bromeliad, closely related to pineapples, that uses the tree for support only. They feed off nutrients and moisture in the air.

We finished our hiking as the sun sank in the western sky, illuminating tall, thin pencil cacti and the spiny edges of pancake-flat prickly pear. What an interesting land here in Central Texas!

The above quote from Teddy Roosevelt was at the bottom of the signage at Hamilton Pool Preserve. The history of that place is humbling–this Oasis in the arid land has been a place of shelter, rest, and wonder for tens of thousands of hiking feet through the eons. As we walked back from the grottoed pool through the towering cypress trees, I felt like I had just received a gift. I was happy the newlyweds and Travis County parks system had shared this place with us.

So what if the Reimer family had kept this natural treasure all to themselves?

I think Roosevelt’s quote also applies to each of us–it’s not what we have that makes us great people–it is the way in which we use it. How do we share our gifts with others?

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