The amazing Desert Botanical Garden, located in a small desert park on the south side of Scottsdale, is in full bloom at this time of year. Our friend KJG has a pass and invited me and mutual friend VickyC for a day in the garden. It is just gorgeous.
Check it out. I think if you click on these images, they should enlarge in all their glory. Click once on an image to isolate it from the gallery and then again for a larger, higher-resolution (ad-free!!) view. Then hit your browser’s back arrow twice to return to this page.
These huge glass sculptures greet visitors near the entrance.
Here’s one up close.
Park-like entry.
First cactus blossom of the day
I love the strangeness of agaves.
Wildflower garden
Wildflowers…penstemon?
Amazing variety
Agaves look like sculptures
Curve-billed thrasher
Blue salvia, I think
A frenzy of columbine
Gorgeous little rockets…
Artsy signage: This is a ceramic sculpture!
And this display is made of wrought rebar
Fairy duster
Verbena
Victoria’s agave
Another cactus flower…to die for!
We found these tiny cacti hiding under a shrub
A Mormon tea-like plant had this bloom of strange flowers
Cactus
Nother cactus
Sacred datura — it’s a hallucinogen
Another sculptural effect
Little red posies
These things are called lion’s tail (another recreational drug plant)
They make a flower atop a flower.
Pretty soon we were seeing flowers on flowers everywhere
Saguaro blossoms
These old saguaros are huge
This bizarre plant is a boojum tree.
Beauty of barrel cactus
Prickly pear blossom
Strange purple flower
We had to stand in line to get into the butterfly exhibit.
Thanks for the pictures. What a fabulous morning!