The wood of the Abydos boats was local Tamarix - tamarisk, salt cedar - not cedar from Lebanon which was used for Khufu’s Solar Barque and favored for shipbuilding in Egypt in later dynasties.
The sand-dunes at Santa Maria bay retain some native vegetation, including Vitex and Tamarix trees.
A school was established on the site in 1951, and took its name from the tamarisk trees that grow in the region, and from the title of the President of Israel, in honor of Israel's first president, Chaim Weizmann.
Tamarix – tamarisk, salt cedar was used to build boats such as the Abydos Boats.
The objectives of the ambitious restoration project are to control exotic plants, particularly the phreatophyte Saltcedar - Tamarix (primarily Tamarix ramosissima and T. parviflora), and restoring critical desert California native plant community "structural elements" for a functioning flora and fauna habitat.
The larvae feed on various trees and shrubs in at least five families of broad-leaved plants, including Cynometra, Heritiera, Mangifera, Terminalia, Rhododendron, Bucida (including Bucida buceras), Canocarpus, Olea, Prunus, Salix and Tamarix species.
Wherever water has been, desert scrub is found, such as tamarisks, Dodartia orientalis, Agriophzyllum gobicum, Calligonium sinnex, and Lycium ruthenicum, but all with their roots elevated on little mounds in the same way as the tamarisks grow in the Taklamakan and the desert of Lop.
Local flora is well represented with the Armeria of Roussillon (Armeria ruscinonensis Girard), the polycarpon of Catalonia (Polycarpon polycarpoides), the Thymelaea hirsuta, the Limonium tremolsii, and also Tamarix (Tamaricaceae), and Gattiliers (Vitex agnus-castus).
The larval food plant is unknown, but the vegetation in the areas where it is found are dominated by Tamarix Prosopis, Acacia and desert shrubs.
In the arid lower reaches there is a more limited flora on the Swakop River valley itself, with the typical gallery vegetation from Ana Trees (Faidherbia albida), tamarisk (Tamarix), camel thorn (Acacia erioloba), Salvadora, various fig species, Euclea and also tobacco (Nicotiana spp.), Jimsonweed (Datura) and mesquite (Prosopis spp.) as invasive species.