Title: Prosopis velutina - Wikipedia
Headings: Prosopis velutina
Prosopis velutina
Contents
Distribution
Description
Ecology
Uses
Food
See also
References
External links

Content: Young bark is reddish-brown and smooth. As it matures, it becomes a dark, dusty gray or brown and takes on a shredded texture. Yellow thorns up to one inch long appear on the young branches. The leaves are about 3-6 in (7.5–15 cm) long, fine, and bipinnately compound. They fold closed at night. Composite image of velvet mesquite leaves folding up in the evening in response to decreasing light levels
The taproot sinks deep into the earth, far deeper than the height of the tree, taking advantage of water sources inaccessible to most plants. Roots extend to about 50 ft (15 m), but depths as much as 175 ft (53 m) have been recorded. Velvet mesquite seeds
Dry velvet mesquite seedpods
Flowering velvet mesquite catkins
The mesquite is deciduous, losing its leaves in winter, and leafs out again in the spring when all danger of frost is past. Because of its deep root system, it keeps its leaves in the dry months of summer in all but the most severe drought years. The flowers are yellow and form in the spring (after the leaves) in dense cylindrical clusters ( catkins) roughly 4 in (10 cm) long.