Ocotillo

In his dusty yard stands his nephew, Ben Erskine, a boy just past the threshold of adolescence, tall for his age, as lean as one of the ocotillo wands that fence the yard. ❋ Unknown (2009)

I went to the spiky bushes—ocotillo, was that the name? ❋ Spencer Quinn (2010)

The rain sweeps over the thirsty silent basins of yucca and mesquite and cardón cactus, over the slopes of ocotillo and acacia. ❋ Peter Heller (2010)

We move through scrubby pines until we emerge onto a scene of blooming cacti, thorny ocotillo plants with licks of flame shooting from their tips, slithering lizards, and brown rabbits whose long ears have been adapted to circulate blood and keep them cool. ❋ Emily W. Upham (2010)

At the base of the mountains, on the gentle rocky slopes called bajadas, the vegetation is dominated by paloverde, ocotillo, and saguaro, but bitterbrush is also a common shrub. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Yucca, sotol, lechuguilla, ocotillo, and cacti now dominate the rocky slopes below 5500 feet. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Vegetation includes mostly desert shrubs, such as sotol, lechuguilla, yucca, ocotillo, lotebush, tarbush, and pricklypear, with a sparse intervening cover of black grama and other grasses. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Well known are the treelike saguaro cactus, the prickly pear cactus, the ocotillo, creosote bush, and smoke tree. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Another remarkable plant found in the Sonora desert is the ocotillo (Fouquieria splendens), which may remain leafless during the coldest months of winter but experiences five or six leafy periods throughout the year. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Vegetation is a sparse, but diverse, shrub cover that includes creosote bush, white brittlebush, white bursage, and occasional Sonoran desert elements, such as ocotillo. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Dominating the vegetation are large stem-succulents, particularly the massive cardón (Pachycereus pringlei, a giant relative of the saguaro), and trees such as palo verde, tree ocotillo (Fouquieria diguetii and F. macdougalii), ironwood, elephant tree (Bursera spp.), and limberbush (Jatropha spp.); the trees are leafless most of the time. ❋ Unknown (2009)

The bajadas and hills include ocotillo, Joshua tree, lechuguilla and prickly pear. ❋ Unknown (2008)

Have you ever sat on a backyard patio surrounded by saguaro, ocotillo, paloverde, and cholla? ❋ Unknown (2008)

At Split Mountain, a one-mile uphill trek past spiny, majestic ocotillo cacti brings you to the so-called Wind Caves, interesting rock formations hollowed out by wind and water. ❋ Unknown (2008)

I walk through gauzy afternoon heat, among cholla and ocotillo, feeling myself a stranger in a foreign landscape. ❋ William Harryman (2007)