Photo Essay
Modified Draws
Most draws of the Llano Estacado have clay soil. Clay soil holds moisture better than other soils, so the draws often have “pocket forests” of soapberry and hackberry. A photoessay examines the clay draw. In places sand has blown into draws, or lines the edges of the draws, so the vegetation can be somewhat different. Another photoessay examines a draw influenced by sand. Some draws are alkaline (and there is a photoessay about such a draw, too.)
When a draw runs through towns on the Llano Estacado, the draw is often turned into a “ditch” to move floodwaters out of town, but just at the edge of town, a draw will be filled with “escaped” ornamental plants. This photoessay examines these “modified” draws.
The 2008 class of the Llano Estacado chapter of the Texas Master Naturalists visited a draw on a local ranch in mid-May. The photographs were taken by Nina McCart, Sharon Long, Sean Patty, Mark Pelham, and Taffy Armstrong.
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Prairie dogs have moved into Midland using the "drainage ditches" as highways. Burrowing owls use old prairie dog holes as nest sites. If rain falls, the burrows will be flooded and the owls and prairie dogs will lose the smaller young, but in 2008, both were able to raise young before a flood came.
Burrowing owls will use electric lines as perches when surveying the area for grasshoppers and beetles, their preferred food.
Jackrabbits will hollow out small pits in the ground to stay cool - the soil a few inches down will cool their stomachs and their bodies.
Starlings seem to hang around prairie dog towns - possibly because the soil is disturbed and they can find insects and seeds easier.
A number of animals use the banks of the "ditches" for burrow sites.
This must have been an older and wiser prairie dog, for its hole was at the top of the ditch.
In this dry year, the bottom of the ditch must have been a little bit easier for digging, for there were plenty of new prairie dog holes.
Flood detritus from the previous year was still "hung up" in a mesquite at the edge of the ditch.
Little barley grew in the bottom of the ditch. It is a common spring "weed grass" usually found where humans disturb the soil.
Some animal caught one of the rabbits of the ditch and left a few inedible parts.
The decollate snail is a common pest in gardens in town. This one must have washed from a home landscape down a street and then into the ditch.
Rumex crispus is an European plant that has become plentiful in barditches, ditches, and playas in West Texas. It has been used as a medicinal plant, for it is full of tannin and a poultice of the leaves will "draw" up the skin around a wound.
Dandelions are another weed from town that can find a place to live in a ditch.
A very late Blue Curls grew in the ditch in May - normally it blooms in April.
Years ago the city of Odessa decided to make a walking park in Monahans Draw (Comanche Trails Park.) Sibley's director of operations was the head of the Odessa Parks Department at the time, and designed the trail.
The Comanche Trails Park is a dense forest of many species of trees more commonly found in home landscapes. Siberian Elm, Chinese Pistache, Osage Orange, Vitex, Fruiting Mulberry, and Honey Locust are among the species found in the draw. Many species of birds nest in the park. It is also the first place a Variable Skink (a species of lizard) was found on the southern Llano Estacado.
This small species of the carrot family found the shady understory an excellent place to grow in the spring. It may be Chervil (Chaerophyllum Tainturieri).
Horse herb (Calyptocarpus vialis) grows in Monahans Draw in the park. It is a common wildflower far to the east (Dallas to San Antonio) and is sometimes used as a ground cover in home landscapes.
Giant Ragweed only grows in the "wetter" draws, near town, in west Texas. It is also known as bloodweed, for its sap is reddish in color. It can reach 15 feet tall in wet years.
Sow thistle is a common weed in town that has found plenty of places to grow in Monahans Draw.
Trees grew up around this yucca. In the effort to survive, it reached for the light and grew a "trunk." Normally this species does not have a trunk.
Fruiting mulberries bring many species of migrating birds to the draw during May.
Both white and black mulberries are found. Sometimes they produce so much fruit the ground is littered with the berries, where skunks, foxes, and mice share the bounty.
Arundo donax (or tallgrass) is also known as cane or bamboo to west Texans. It was brought as a windbreak plant by the early settlers. It grows 12 feet tall in wet years.
Pink evening primrose is a popular home landscape plant, and along with four- o-clocks and garden larkspur is often found in the draws of the towns.
Cardinals love the dense forest of the draws.
Clematis (old man's beard) grows on many of the trees in the draws.
Mississippi Kites came to west Texas in the late 1950s and nested in the tall Siberian Elms planted in the 1950s and fed on the dog day cicadas that came with the elms. They arrive in April and leave by September. If a person is near their nest, they divebomb the person and sometimes draw blood when their talons scrape a person's head.
Black chinned hummingbirds find plenty of insects to catch in the draws, as well as feeding from the four-o-clocks and other tubular blossomed plants.
During migration, many species of sparrows visit the draw. In 2008 Chipping Sparrows were easily found in several habitats.
Honey locust branches created a beautiful dappled scene.
Virginia creeper is another home landscape plant that grows over many of the trees in the draws.
Mexican hat is a native, but it loves the clay soil in the bottom of Monahans draw.
Garden larkspur seemed out of place in the dry grasses of the bottom of the draw in 2008.