Natural History

Plants & People Gardens
Guidebook

The ethnobotany guide available here to download will lead you through the Black Range Museum backyard gardens. These were designed to enhance our medical room displays, highlight native plants that were critical to lives of early people here such as the Apache and later Hispanic and other settlers, and also demonstrate the use of beautiful native plants in a landscape setting.

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We thank the Native Plant Society of New Mexico Carter Conservation Fund for funding the printing of our Guide and the purchase of our native landscape plants for the Courtyard Gardens at the Black Range Museum.

Cover: Opuntia macrorhiza by Mara Trushell Guerrero

Color Photos of Plants found in the Guide - Click for a larger image

Agave parryi flower stalk emerging from rosette of the plant (which blooms once then dies) — Parry Agave flower stalk

Yucca baccata, Banana Yucca with showy cream-color flowers — Banana Yucca (Yucca baccata) in flower

Large Soaptree Yucca, Yucca elata plant with large dry flower stalks — *Soaptree Yucca (Yucca elata)

Creamy white flowers on stalk of Soaptree Yucca (Yucca elata) — *Flowers of Soaptree Yucca

Dasylirion wheeleri growing in its natural habitat south of Hillsboro NM — Sotol (Dasylirion wheeleri) in native habitat

Dasylirion wheeleri with native buckwheat — Sotol with Wright’s Buckwheat

Prickly Pear cactus with numerous yellow flowers. — *Prickly Pear (Opuntia engelmanii)

Cholla in full pink flowers (Cylindropuntia imbricata var. spinosior) — *Cane Cholla (Cylindropuntia imbricata)

Algerita, Barberry with yellow flowers. — *Algerita (Mahonia haematocarpa)

Bright red fruits of Algerita — *Algerita fruits

Hackberry leaves close — Hackberry leaves (Celtis reticulata)

Chilopsis linearis, Desert Willow in flower — Desert Willow (Chilopsis linearis) flowers

Ephedra stems up close to see cones — Ephedra trifuca

*Apache Plume Flowers (Fallugia paradoxa)

Pink, feathery Apache Plume seeds — *Apache Plume Seeds (Fallugia paradoxa)

New Mexico Olive (Forestiera neomexicana)

Yellow flowers and fruit on Creosote Bush — Creosote flowers (Larrea tridentata)

Seeds hanging from branches of Larrea tridentata — Creosote Seeds

Honey Mesquite (Prosopis or Neltuma glandulosa)

Clusters of flowers on Honey Mesquite with honey bees. — Honey Mesquite Flowers

Mature legume pod on Prosopis velutina — *Mature Honey Mesquite Legume

Rhus trilobata shrub in flower — Three-leaf Sumac (Rhus trilobata)

Rhus trilobata flowers up close — Three-leaf Sumac flowers

Flowers of Sambucus mexicana, Mexican Elderberry — Elderberry (Sambucus mexicana)

Photos marked * are used with permission and our thanks to Western New Mexico University Department of Natural Sciences and the Dale A. Zimmerman Herbarium.

More information will be added here in the near future.

Some Sources of Information on the Traditional Uses of Plants

Apaches – A History and Culture Portrait. James L. Haley. University of Oklahoma Press, 1981.

Edible Native Plants of the Rocky Mountains. H.D. Harrington. University of New Mexico Press, 1967.

Healing Herbs of the Upper Rio Grande. Traditional Medicine of the Southwest. L.S.M. Curtin, revised and edited by Michael Moore. Western Edge Press, 1997.

Healing Plant of the Rio Grand Valley: Hispano and Pueblo Uses of Nature. Verónica Iglesias Swanson and Carlos Vásquez editors. 2008. National Hispanic Cultural Center.

Healing with Plants in the American and Mexican West. Margarita Artschwager Kay. University of Arizona Press, 1996.

Los Remedios de la Gente, compiled by Michael Moore, 1977, Santa Fe, NM 97501

Los Remedios. Traditional Herbal Remedies of the Southwest. Michael Moore. Museum of New Mexico Press, 1990

Medicinal Plants of the American Southwest. Charles W. Kane. Lincoln Town Press, 2022.

Medicinal Plants of the Desert and Canyon West. Michael Moore. Museum of New Mexico Press, 1989.

Wild Plants and Native Peoples of the Four Corners. William W. Dunmire and Gail D. Tierney. Museum of New Mexico Press 1997.

Coming Soon!

Walk Through Time
Geology

A Courtyard entry display is in process that will highlight the geology of the Black Range and foothills that resulted in the development of the Gold and Silver in our area — the presence of these minerals created the rush that led to the communities of Hillsboro, Lake Valley and Kingston developing in the later 1800’s.