HFF everyone!

Indeed, and I'll get some more shots of the whole tree when the sun comes out again!

Hi Andy!
I missed this when you originally posted it! Tamarisk species (a.k.a. salt cedar in this part of the world) are some of the most notorious invader species in the American Southwest, and (as per usual) were imported with The Best of Intentions. Here are a few photos of feral tamarisk:
www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/23558737
www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/39439490
www.ipernity.com/doc/289859/43080626
Hopefully they don’t get away over there ;)

I had no idea of any of this, Steve! Thank you for filling in a gap in my education. I just saw an attractive spring blossom. I guess others thought so too and went ahead with planting. The story of much of humankind's well-meaning, but actually ham-fisted, approach to nature.

Glad you found it of interest, Andy! They were good for soil stabilization, which was the motivation for planting them, but there were some unintended consequences...
Knowing your interest in language, too: we always called tamarisk “salt cedar” when I was a kid. I didn’t learn “tamarisk” for years! I would guess it’s an Americanism, but the Online Etymology Dictionary is no help. Dictionary.com says the phrase dates to the early 1880s, at any rate. “Cedar” may just have been used for any vaguely exotic sort-of evergreen tree. In another usage from my childhood, we also called the junipers that are abundant at middling elevations in the US west “scrub cedar.”