It takes a patient, thoughtful observer like Arboretum volunteer and birder Jack Bartley to point out the mid-summer bounty of fruit-eating opportunities for wildlife at Boyce Thompson Arboretum. It’s not only about the ripening of red, ripe saguaro fruits–which is huge–but also about the fruiting potential of hundreds of other plants, like desert hackberries and condalias that are growing in the Arboretum’s plant collections and dare to fruit in the middle of the summer. Jack is keenly aware that knowing what birds eat is the best way to find them, and he reminded me of a half dozen fruiting shrubs that he had seen earlier that day. [Read more…]