Fever Tree
The fever tree catches the light before you notice its leaves. Its yellow-green trunk and branches stand out against a blue desert sky, while small, fernlike leaflets create a fine-textured canopy. Mark...
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- Non-native
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A closer look.
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Photographs from Desert Oasis Insider’s plant collection. Locations are shown where recorded in the original gallery.
Get to know this plant.
About this classification: Non-native
Grown here, with origins outside the local native flora. Non-native describes geographic origin; it does not automatically mean invasive.
The fever tree catches the light before you notice its leaves. Its yellow-green trunk and branches stand out against a blue desert sky, while small, fernlike leaflets create a fine-textured canopy. Mark Miller photographed this tree at The Living Desert in Palm Desert on October 15, 2026.
At a glance
- Botanical name: Vachellia xanthophloea; formerly Acacia xanthophloea
- Plant type: Large, thorn-bearing tree in the pea family
- Native range: Eastern and southern Africa
- Coachella Valley status: Cultivated, non-native
- Look for: Powdery yellow-green bark, finely divided leaves and paired pale thorns
How to recognize it
The combination matters: smooth, brightly colored bark; leaves divided into rows of tiny leaflets; and long, straight thorns occurring in pairs. Mature trees can develop a broad, open crown. Small rounded clusters of yellow flowers provide another clue when the tree is blooming.
A palo verde can also have green bark, but bark color alone does not make the two trees interchangeable. The featherlike foliage and paired white thorns visible here support the fever-tree identification.
An African tree in a desert garden
In its native range, fever tree often grows beside rivers and in low ground with access to water. Seeing it in a desert garden does not mean it is a native desert tree or needs no irrigation. It can become a substantial tree, so planting space, water availability and thorns deserve consideration.
About this photograph
This is a photo-based identification from the bark, foliage and thorns. A garden label or accession record was not photographed. The image records a cultivated tree at The Living Desert, not a wild Coachella Valley population.
Explore more
Sources
- University of Arizona Campus Arboretum: Fever tree
- South African National Biodiversity Institute: Vachellia xanthophloea
- Kew: Botanical descriptions and habitat
Photography © Mark Miller, October 15, 2026. Botanical sources checked October 15, 2026.
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