Common names: BLADDERPOD, BEAD-POD Arizona and Texas deserts: (Lesquerella gordoni). Yellow. February-May. California desert: (Lesquerella palmeri). Yellow. March-May. Mustard family. Size: 6 to 8 inches high.
Extensive sections of the desert are gilded in springtime with this low-growing annual herb which is one of the earliest of the desert flowers.
Following moist winters, it covers dry mesas and plains below 4,000 feet from Oklahoma west to Utah, and southward into northern Mexico. After the seed pods have matured, the plant is reported to furnish valuable forage for range stock.
YELLOW
Cucurbita digitata
Cucurbita foetidissima
Common names: BUFFALO-GOURD, COYOTE-MELON, (CALABAZILLA), (CHILI COYOTE) Arizona desert: (Cucurbita digitata). Yellow. June-October. California desert: (Cucurbita palmata). Yellow. July-September. Texas desert: (Cucurbita foetidissima). Yellow. May-August. Gourd family. Size: Trailing perennial with stems 4 to 15 feet long.
Gourds are conspicuous, trailing, rank-growing plants common along roadsides and in the open desert. Leaves are grayish-green, and blossoms yellow and trumpet-shaped. The striped fruits are about the size and shape of a tennis ball, although some are egg-shaped.
The fruits which are very conspicuous after the vines and leaves have been winter-killed, are sometimes collected, painted in gay colors, and used as ornaments about the house.
Although Indians considered the fruits as inferior and suitable only for coyotes, they ate them either cooked or dried, and made the seeds into a mush. Pioneers used the crushed roots of these plants as a cleansing agent in washing clothes.