Whilst birdwatching in Jubail I saw a number of
new Desert Hyacinth Cistanche tubulosa
just starting to appear. The Desert Hyacinth is a widely distributed annual
that produces a dense pyramid spike of bright yellow flowers topped by
maroon-tinted buds. The yellow flowers do not smell very nice and flies are
attracted to the smell and carry the pollen on their legs from plant to plant helping
with pollination. They are parasitic, one of several such plants in Arabia, and
live off other plants to gain their nutritional needs, as they have no green
parts or leaves to synthesize chlorophyll directly. The many tiny seeds may
remain dormant for years until the roots of the host plant are close enough to
trigger germination. It is one of the showiest plants of Eastern Arabia with
bright yellow, dense column of flowers sometimes approaching one metre in
height. It has varying flower colour with the flowers either tightly packed in
the spike or loose. They are widespread on sandy or sandy-silty ground and can
tolerate saline environments as well as disturbed conditions, so are often seen
growing near roads or tracks in the desert or along the shores of the Arabian
Gulf.
