Parkinsonia florida - Blue palo verde

Blue palo verde (Parkinsonia florida) is a prickly, deciduous desert tree or shrub of the southwestern North American deserts. Its pods and seeds are edible after thorough cooking but are mildly poisonous and can cause digestive upset in quantity, so they were traditionally eaten only occasionally, as a famine food.¹

Inputs

• Hardiness zone 8¹
• Hardiness zone 9¹
• Hardiness zone 10¹
• Hardiness zone 11¹
• Full sun¹
• Well drained soil¹

Outputs

• Emergency food¹

Type

• Tree
• Shrub
• Deciduous

Functions

• Attracting bees¹
• Drought-tolerance¹
• Fire resistance²

Dimension	At maturity
Height (m)	2.5-8
Diameter (m)	5

Footnotes

1. Parkinsonia florida | Plants for a Future ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰

2. Leaf burn times of California native plants, Las Pilitas Nursery, 2005 propane-torch ignition trial, live-leaf ignition time >60 seconds ↩