Mimosa distachya var. laxiflora
Gatuño
Family: Fabaceae
Semideciduous shrub to about 6x6’. Pink catkin flowers May through September.
Grow in full sun, with moderate water, probably hardy to about 25°F.
The flowers are nectar-rich attracting butterflies and other nectar-seekers. Moth larval food plant for the cecrops eyed silkmoth (Automeris cecrops), geometer moths (family Geometridae), the mystifying black witch moth (Ascalapha odorata), the bizarre mesquite clearwing moth (Carmenta prosopis), various bagworm moths (family Psychidae). Butterfly larval food plant for the reakirt’s blue (Echinargus isola) and the mimosa yellow sulfur (Pyrisitia nise). Good shelter plant for small animals. Seeds eaten by quail and other granivorous birds.
Mimosa distachya on iNaturalist
Photo by Tom Van Devender, SEINET
The genus name Mimosa is from modern Latin, apparently from Latin mimus ‘mime’—because famous members of this genus have leaves that respond to touch with movement, seemingly mimicing the sensitivity of an animal. The species distachya basically means two prickles, referring to the spines. The variety laxiflora is from the Latin words 'laxus' meaning "loose" and 'flos' meaning "flower" in reference to the loose open arrangement of the flowers. There are 628 species native to the Americas, from North Dakota to northern Argentina, and to eastern Africa as well as the Indian subcontinent and Indochina.
Native to rocky slopes and canyons in southeastern Arizona, and very common in Sonora and Baja California, continuing down into southern Mexico, but in more scattered populations.