Essays

Moseying: Exploring the Natural World

The Devil's River
June 12, 2002

Have you ever been to the valley of the pipe vine? Folks love to raft the Devil’s River, known for the crystal clear water that appears green in its deepest pools. Hundreds of people visit the valley every year.

Pipe vine is a powerful medicine, long used by Native Americans. It is most often found at archaeological sites, in overhangs used for shelter for thousands of years. Human detritus – unused plant parts left over after processing, bones of animals, old clothing, excrement – forms dark humus beneath the overhangs. Pipe vine prefers just such a growing medium.

Pipe vine Swallowtail butterflies, which visit the southern Llano Estacado each growing season, use most species of the Aristolochia genus as their larval food source. If their caterpillars do not eat pipe vine (which doesn’t grow here on the Llano), they die. Pipe vine is inconspicuous to the human eye, even to an avid amateur naturalist, for its habitat is under trees and shrubs in leaf litter and among rocks.

Pipe vine is pollinated by a tiny female fly. This fly must suck blood out of rodent ears to reproduce. The small brown and red pipe vine bloom resembles a mouse ear and exudes carbon dioxide. Confused by the scent and appearance, the fly enters the bloom and becomes trapped, shaking the bloom’s anthers and dusting its body with the pollen in its frantic efforts to escape. Once free, the fly continues her search for blood, visiting more pipe vines before finally finding a mouse. She then deposits her eggs in water that is no more than a light sheen over bare rock.

The valley of the pipe vine has the waterfall with the greatest volume of water in Texas. Pipe vine grows in a sacred grove just south of that waterfall. At the mouth of a narrow side canyon are two dozen Mexican white oaks that are two hundred miles north of any other of their kind. Pipe vine querls in the shade of the ancient trees, its blooms trumpeting history into the still, dense tropical air. A shaded backwater pool from the river glows emerald, where a small green kingfisher rattles questioningly whenever a visitor intrudes.

Upon entering the place, a visitor must inhale deeply, for the rich fecund odors fill the air and seem to overpower the presence of oxygen. It is an unnerving sensation, stopping the mind, and setting the imagination adrift. Why are the oaks so far north? The pictographs on the canyon walls may hold the answer. The rock paintings of the region are famous the world over, and Midland archaeologist, Eunice Barkes, told me that archaeologists have recently linked the drawings to the cosmology of a tribe of native Americans still living in Northern Mexico.

Native Americans had an extensive trade network. Abalone shell from Baja California has been found in Mississippian mound builder ruins. Obsidian from Wyoming has been found in New Mexico. Certain places, such as the waterfall in the valley of the pipe vine, are easily remembered landmarks which, over time, could have become the sites of annual trade fairs.

Eunice gave me a photograph of pipe vine a number of years ago, requesting an identification of the plant. When she told me of finding it at a number of rock art sites, I did more research and discovered its medicinal use. A few years later, the Boyce Thompson Arboretum published the research about its pollinator. This incredible plant fascinated me, and it became something I desperately wanted to see. Whenever I found myself in the correct habitat, I searched diligently. But, for over a decade, I was never successful.

When I visited the sacred grove of the waterfall in the valley of the pipe vine, I found a ledge of rock to sit on, overwhelmed by the sensations described above. I did not notice the pipe vine immediately as I sat surveying the surroundings. I waited for the kingfisher to settle down and quit its fussing, and listened for the white-eyed vireos to commence singing again. When the avian inhabitants of the place returned to their daily lives and began to ignore me, I finally lowered my eyes to the ground.

The first thing I spotted was the large droppings of turkeys, their “J” shape obvious against the leaf litter. Literally hundreds of turkey droppings speckled the ground: fresh droppings from the early morning, as well as ones that had turned white and powdery with age. Some dead leaves rustled, and I wondered if a Trans-Pecos Copperhead might be moving about in mid-morning, so I scanned the area from where the sound emanated.

I could not locate the noisemaker. I stared at the area, waiting for another disturbance, until my eyes finally focused on the green leaves poking up through the leaf litter. Pipe vine! Forgetting the potential presence of a poisonous serpent, I scuttled over, and knelt to examine it, finding the tiny blooms half-hidden in the foliage. “Oh, my gosh, my word, Pipe vine!”

I could not touch it. I could not photograph it. To do so seemed a sacrilege. I do not understand why I felt so. My imagination flooded me with a story. The waterfall could have been a holy place, with dozens of creation- and culture-hero stories that heightened its importance, making it a sacrosanct refuge, the destination of pilgrims who might have found shelter under the rock ledges in the canyon beside the waterfall.

Shamans were not only doctors that prescribed plant medicines, but also served as the tribal “psychiatrists.” To sort out disharmony in the complexities of life, a tribal holy man might have traveled to such a place of contemplation in order to gain a refreshed perspective on situations affecting his people. On such a pilgrimage, he might have carried a sack of acorns to grind for a ritual meal, and the leftover acorns might have been planted or scattered. How many thousands of years of human history did the place represent? No wonder I could not touch the plant. I stood, and quietly walked away with tears of wonder in my eyes.