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LLano Estacado Wildflowers

Hi everyone. I've recently taken to stopping and snapping a picture of any wildflowers as I'm driving about, and this morning the wife and I took a hike around our little state park and took quite a few photos. We've had a pretty wet and mild spring so the flowers are really popping up right now. I thought I'd show you what we have in my neck of the woods seeing that many of you are from much more gentle parts of the country.

First let me give you some background. I live in a geographical area known as the Llano Estacado. Essentially it's a gigantic mesa/plateau spanning over West Texas and Eastern New Mexico. It's known for having very little elevation change (II think it's somewhere around an average of <10ft change per mile) and it sits higher up than the rest of the great plains; our elevation is 4000ft. We get very little in the way of rainfall and an average of <20%RH, this and constant winds over 20mph have a habit of desiccating most plants. However, there is a lot of beauty if you look for it.


Abronia fragrans
AbroniaFragrans.jpg


Calylophus hartwegii
CalylophusHartwegii.jpg


Carduus nutans
These were over 6ft tall
CarduusNutans.jpg


CNutans.jpg


Convolvulus arvensis
A highly invasive species believed to be brought in from contaminated seed. It only lives where there's quite a bit of water for the area, primarily drainage ditches and crops.
ConvolvulusArvensis.jpg


Cryptantha flavoculata
CryptanthaFlavoculata.jpg


Curcurbita foetidissima
Just a flower bud, but I'll probably post a pic of the full bloom later on. I think this a a very interesting plant. Known as buffalo melon or buffalo gourd.
CurcurbitaFoetidissima.jpg


Dimorphocarpa wislizenii
DimorphocarpaWislizenii2.jpg


Erigeron spp.
ErigeronSpp.jpg


Gaillardia pulchella
Firewheel
GaillardiaPulchella.jpg


GaillardiaPulchella2.jpg


Hedyotis acerosa
HedyotisAcerosa.jpg


Glandularia bipinnatifida
IMG_7990.jpg


Linum lewisii var. lewisii
LinumLewisiiVarLewisii.jpg


LinumLewisiiVarLewisii2.jpg


Melampodium leucanthum
MelampodiumLeucanthum.jpg


Melilotus officinalis
MelilotusOfficinalis.jpg


Oenothere pallida subspecies gypsophila
Primrose
OenotheraPallidaSubsGypsophila.jpg


OenotheraPallidaSubspGypsophila.jpg
 
Opuntia phaecantha
Prairie prickly pear
OpuntiaPhaeacantha.jpg
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Physaria fendleri
PhysariaFendleri2.jpg


Psilostrophe tagetina
Paperflower
PsilostropheTagetina.jpg


Quincula lobata
QuinculaLobata.jpg


Solanum eleagnifolium
Silver leaf nightshade
SolanumElaeagnifolium.jpg


Solanum rostratum
Buffalo bur
SolanumRostratum.jpg


Sphaeralcea coccinea
SphaeralceaCoccinea.jpg


SphaeralceaCoccinea2.jpg


Sphaeralcea spp.
SphaeralceaSpp.jpg


Thelesperma megapotamicum
ThelespermaMegapotamicum.jpg


Tradescantia occidentalis
Spiderwort
TradescantiaOccidentalis.jpg


Tragopogon dubius
Goat's beard
TragopogonDubius.jpg


Verbesina encelioides
VerbesinaEncelioides.jpg


Xanthisima spinulosum
XanthismaSpinulosum.jpg


Yucca faxoniana
Just barely catching the bloom. I'll try and get pics of a full one soon. It's quite impressive.
YuccaFaxoniana.jpg


YuccaFaxoniana2.jpg
 
BONUS REPTILES!!!!

six lined race runner, or maybe prairie racerunner... Very difficult to photograph.
IMG_8541.jpg


Horned lizard
DSCN5058.jpg


Also lots of these guys.
IMG_8488.jpg


IMG_8506.jpg


IMG_8513.jpg


And this one looks very similar to the others with a different patterning.
IMG_8530.jpg
 
Difficult to tell if the 1st one is a Six Lined or a juvie of the Prairie subspecies although I wasn't aware the Six Lined made it out that far west. Love those little guys. The horned lizard appears to be P.cornutum. P.solarae has a larger more well defined crown and the other species native to NM can't really be mistaken with the other 2. I think the next 3 are Uta stansburiana but some could also be Sceloporus species . I'm terrible at ID'ing the native "fence lizards" and their kin. The last one is an Earless Lizard, probably Holbrookia maculata or 1 of it's subspecies. Great photos, very jealous of what's lurking in your backyard.
 
He wears the ring of power! :ohno:


Also, those are some really cool pictures.
the lizards blew my socks off
 
@Johnny: There was another race runner type lizard as well. Couldn't get a shot of it. Almost identical shape and size. But without stripes, has a very mottled almost checkered pattern. They're pretty common. I'll try and get a pic if I ever have a camera handy for the three seconds they sit still.

@nem: and I love this ring. It's actually the ring I talked my wife into letting me get married with. It's. ..precious to me. ..

And thanks to both of you for the compliments on the photos. I bought a vivitar series 1 lens a few years back, and I'm just getting to using it.
 
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@Johnny: There was another race runner type lizard as well. Couldn't get a shot of it. Almost identical shape and size. But without stripes, has a very mottled almost checkered pattern. They're pretty common. I'll try and get a pic if I ever have a camera handy for the three seconds they sit still.

There's about a dozen species of Racerunner/Whiptail out where you are. The checkered species are super cool. So tough to get a decent photo of though.
 
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Well, how about it? We caught one in my back yard this afternoon.

20150525_140208.jpg


20150525_140316.jpg
 
Such cool little lizards. There's a parthenogenic population of these somewhere in the Southwest. I believe that some species are also able to change their sex depending on population levels.
 
  • #10
The New Mexico State reptile is a parthenogenic whiptail.
 
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