We first collected wildflower images during a Wildflower Walk conducted as part of the Cascabel Hermitage Association Workshop Series for 2001, organized by Pearl Mast and David Omick and led by Professor Steve McLaughlin, a botanist for the University of Arizona Arid Lands Program, and his assistant Elaine Nakasian. In all, some 53 species were identified, the full list of which may be obtained from Tom Orum at torum@mindspring.com. We have since continued to add images as we encounter them, building the image collections outlined below.

Main reference sources for our own identification efforts: Niehaus, Theodore, Ripper, Charles, & Virginia Savage, 1984, Southwestern and Texas Wildflowers, The Peterson Field Guide Series, Boston: Houghton Mifflin; and Epple, Anne & Lewis Epple, 1995, A Field Guide to the Plants of Arizona, Helena Montana: Fountain Press; Bowers, Janice, 1993, Shrubs and Trees of the Southwestern Deserts, Tucson: SW Parks & Monuments Association; Dodge, Natt, 1985, Flowers of the Southwest Deserts, SW Parks & Monuments Association; Kearney, Thomas & Robert Peebles, 1960, Arizona Flora, 2nd ed., Berkeley CA: University of California Press; Jaeger, Edmund, 1941, Desert Wildflowers, Stanford: Stanford University Press. These excellent guides provide a strong basis for identifying our local wildflowers (though see below for caveats).

Clink on this Link for more images of the 2001 Wildflower Walk, and this one for a species list obtained from that walk. Click on Flowering Schedules for the William G. McGinnies list for the Sonoran desert, compiled during the years between 1966 and 1985; and on Seasonal Changes in Our Area for further local information on that subject.

(Drawing below by Michael Henderson)

Click on the Underlined names of the images below to enter pages with more detailed images!

(Please note: some of our identifications are tentative -- we are not experts in these fields. Informed viewers who see errors or can make correct IDs where we are stumped, please contact us and we will make any necessary corrections.)