THE HORSE BEAN.
Parkinsonia aculeata, Linn.
The horse bean or retama, native to the valleys of the lower Rio Grande and Colorado River, is a small graceful pod-bearing tree of drooping branches set with strong spines, long leaf-stems, branching and set with many pairs of tiny leaflets.
The bright yellow, fragrant flowers are almost perennial. In Texas the tree is out of bloom only in midwinter. In the
tropics, it is ever-blooming. The fruit hangs in graceful racemes, dark orange-brown in color, and compressed be tween the remote beans. As a hedge and ornamental garden plant, this tree has no equal in the Southwest. It is met with in cultivation in most warm countries.