Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogelbaum. Here. If you were to grab the nearest
Speaker 1: piece of paper and draw a cactus, think not something
Speaker 1: you might have in your house, but a wild desert cactus.
Speaker 1: Chances are decent that the first thing that would come
Speaker 1: to mind would be a tall, cylindrical cactus with a
Speaker 1: couple arms sticking out from the sides with bent elbows
Speaker 1: pointing upward. This is the sowarrow cactus, and it's the
Speaker 1: only cactus on the planet that looks like that. In
Speaker 1: spite of its iconic silhouette made popular in Hollywood, Western
Speaker 1: films and Looney Tunes, of most people have never seen
Speaker 1: one in real life, as it only grows in a
Speaker 1: small area of the American Southwest and northern Mexico. Suarrows
Speaker 1: are the tallest North American cacti, native to and common
Speaker 1: throughout the Sonoran Desert in the southwestern corner of the
Speaker 1: United States and northwestern Mexico. Or they can be the tallest,
Speaker 1: they grow very slowly. At the age of ten years
Speaker 1: a soorrow might still be less than two inches high
Speaker 1: that's less than five centimeters, but over their entire lifespan,
Speaker 1: which can be over one hundred and fifty years. They
Speaker 1: can grow as much as forty to sixty feet tall
Speaker 1: that's twelve to eighteen meters. They don't always grow their
Speaker 1: iconic arms, but they can grow over twenty five of them,
Speaker 1: and when they're fully hydrated and thriving, they can weigh
Speaker 1: over thirty two hundred pounds that's fifteen hundred kilos. Because
Speaker 1: of their size, soarrows are important to the local ecosystem
Speaker 1: as they provide food and shelter for various desert animals,
Speaker 1: and because they're often the tallest thing standing in the
Speaker 1: desert landscape, they can fill the niche that's usually occupied
Speaker 1: by trees. They are the desert go to for nesting
Speaker 1: and perching birds and protection for other animals, and once
Speaker 1: a sorrow has died and fallen, its decomposing body provides
Speaker 1: important organic matter to the desert ecosystem. A sowarro cacti
Speaker 1: have also been an important natural resource for the indigenous
Speaker 1: peoples of the Sonoran Desert before the article. This episode
Speaker 1: is based on How Stuffworks. Spoke by email with Kat Rumbley,
Speaker 1: marketing and media manager at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum
Speaker 1: in Tucson, Arizona. She said, the tohono o Odam Seri
Speaker 1: and other local peoples have used sowaro as a food
Speaker 1: plant and used sowaro ribs as construction material. Many members
Speaker 1: of the tohono Ohodam nation still harvest toarrow fruit to
Speaker 1: this day, as the harvest marks their new year and
Speaker 1: provides them with sowarro syrup for the year to come.
Speaker 1: In the cultural traditions of the tahono Ohodam, the soarros
Speaker 1: are considered people the ancestors of today's tahono Ohodam. While
Speaker 1: some other cacties spread by vegetative reproduction essentially cloning. A
Speaker 1: soarows reproduced by seed which they grow in stout pretty
Speaker 1: cone shaped flowers that are white with a creamy yellow center.
Speaker 1: It's the state flower of Arizona, and they require a
Speaker 1: pollinator to get those flowers pollen from plant to plant.
Speaker 1: A Rumbley explained, flowers of the sowarrow are pollinated by
Speaker 1: the Lesser long nosed bat and the Mexican long tongued
Speaker 1: bat at night, and by bees and birds such as
Speaker 1: the white winged dove during the day. Soorrow fruits develop
Speaker 1: right before summer monsoon rainfall and serve as a critical
Speaker 1: food and moisture source for animals after the famine period
Speaker 1: of dry early summer. Those fruits are green on the
Speaker 1: outside as they develop, and can blush pinkish when they mature,
Speaker 1: and many split open in a way that honestly looks
Speaker 1: a little like a demigorgon from Stranger Things, but instead
Speaker 1: of a gaping mall of teeth, they have bright red
Speaker 1: flesh and many small black seeds. The fruit is very
Speaker 1: sweet and can be eaten raw or processed into jams, syrups,
Speaker 1: fruit leather, wine, or non alcoholic drinks. The seeds are
Speaker 1: nutty and can be eaten raw or dried, and ground
Speaker 1: and flour, which can be used in baked goods like cookies, crackers,
Speaker 1: or flatbreads, or to make a tasty porridge. If the
Speaker 1: fruits aren't harvested when the heavy monsoon rains come in
Speaker 1: midsummer in early autumn, they're knocked from the tops of
Speaker 1: the plant to the base and can be carried by
Speaker 1: floods to be established in new spots. Their seeds are
Speaker 1: also spread by animals that eat their fruits, and perhaps
Speaker 1: especially ants which berry a surplus of sowarrow seeds in
Speaker 1: their nests for their larvae to eat. Rumbly said, the
Speaker 1: conditions for successful sowarrow seed germination are relatively specific, so
Speaker 1: you'll notice large cohorts of cacti that are all the
Speaker 1: same age due to establishment in u years. With these
Speaker 1: specific conditions, saros have a pretty broad geographic range for
Speaker 1: a plant that's so specifically designed for one ecosystem, but
Speaker 1: cold is their kryptonite. They avoid both the cold air
Speaker 1: drainage basins in the lowest areas of the Snaran Desert
Speaker 1: as well as any elevations high enough to have much frost. Therefore,
Speaker 1: soarrows keep to the warm air belts in the foothills
Speaker 1: at the base of desert mountains within their range. The
Speaker 1: sowarro currently faces threats such as wildfires, increased summer temperatures,
Speaker 1: and inconsistent rainfall due to climate change, as well as
Speaker 1: loss of habitat due to livestock, invasive species, and people
Speaker 1: building a bunch of stuff. Rumbley said development and increased
Speaker 1: urbanization within its habitat removes mature plants, eliminates the favorable
Speaker 1: areas for suarrows to establish, and influences climate change by
Speaker 1: producing urban heat eyeland that become inhospitable to soarows. A
Speaker 1: mature soorrow can produce about a million seeds every year,
Speaker 1: but even under good conditions, only a few will survive
Speaker 1: to become mature cacti themselves. Changes in rainfall patterns affect
Speaker 1: the establishment of young soarrows, as the younglings need dependable
Speaker 1: watering and they suffer under constant record breaking high temperatures.
Speaker 1: And the introduction of grazing to desert landscapes has reduced
Speaker 1: nurse plant cover and is thought to be negatively affecting
Speaker 1: sowarrow establishment. A rumbly said human introduced invasives such as
Speaker 1: buffal grass, create fodder for wildfires that would not traditionally
Speaker 1: be able to spread in the sparse desert landscape. The
Speaker 1: soarrows are ill adapted to fire, as are many desert
Speaker 1: endemic species, and are not able to recover from significant
Speaker 1: burn events. A cattle ranchers first brought buffalo grass to
Speaker 1: the area in the nineteen thirties, hoping to feed their
Speaker 1: herds and control erosion. Buffalgrass is now considered invasive. It
Speaker 1: can double an abundance in as little as three years.
Speaker 1: Removal efforts have been ongoing since nineteen ninety and a
Speaker 1: number of measures have proven successful without harming other local wildlife.
Speaker 1: To learn more, including how you can help, check out
Speaker 1: friendsofsowaro dot org. That's Friends of sag Uaro dot org.
Speaker 1: They're not a sponsor, we just think they're pretty cool.
Speaker 1: Today's episode is based on the article the Souaro cactus
Speaker 1: is an iconic symbol of the Americansouthwest on how Stuffworks
Speaker 1: dot com, written by Jesslynshields. The brain Stuff is production
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Speaker 1: is produced by Tyler Klang. Four more podcasts from my
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