Wildflowers

[Turtle]

the weather has broken, but so has my back. :smilingsun: :Crunk: i can't even get a decent photo in my garden as i squat and wobble like a sotted weeble. flowers! damned if you do & damned if you don't. :lol:

 

anyway, this poor shot is part of a very successful patch of native early blue violets - Viola adunca that i have going in the yard. they showed up volunteer, they are perrenial, and they produce seed like crazy. now covering a couple dozen square feet, they are suppressing weeds, they tolerate walking on them, and i don't have to water them. winning!!!! ;)

 

that's that.

[Turtle]

well, it got dry and sunnyish long enough to find & id another introduced plant in my yard. this one growing in my natives-only bed! :cussing: i see burke herbarium's map doesn't show it in my county yet. guess that's it. :shrug:

 

 

 

thalecress @burke herbarium

 

thalecress - Arabidopsis thaliana (aka mouse-ear cress)

may 13, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - introduced

 

blooms:

 

whole-plant view with basal leaf detail:

[Turtle]

another break from the rain today & i checked out a suburban woodlot next to a market that i frequent. ran into many old flower friends, native & otherwise, and found something new too. it's a native, and it's poison! :omg: i'm wishing a little bit now that i didn't smell the flowers. or did i smell them? :edizzy: i'm a little fuzzy on that. time will tell i guess. :clock: anyways, here's the goods, the bads, & the beauties.

 

baneberry @burke herbarium

 

baneberry@wikipediac

Uses

...

Native Americans used the juice from the fruits of various baneberry species to poison arrows, and used the root as a herbal remedy for menstrual problems.

...

Toxicity

All parts of the plant are poisonous. However, accidental poisoning is not likely since the berries are extremely bitter.

 

The berries are the most toxic part of the plant. A healthy adult will experience poisoning from as few as 6 berries. Ingestion of the berries causes nausea dizziness, increased pulse and severe gastrointestinal discomfort.[6][7]The toxins can also have an immediate sedative effect on the cardiac muscle tissue possibly leading to cardiac arrest if introduced into the bloodstream. As few as 2 berries may be fatal to a

child.[7]

The fruits and foliage contain ranunculine,[8] and are often reported to contain protoanemonin.

All parts of the plant contain an irritant oil that is most concentrated within the roots and berries.

The roots contain β-sitosterol glucoside.[9]

...

 

 

 

baneberry - Actaea rubra (aka red baneberry)

may 18, 2011

suburban woodlot

clark county washington - native

 

blooms:

 

whole-plant view:

[Turtle]

pretty much rain & gray since last post. today not so much. didn't get past the yard but that was good enough for a start on the promised sunny shiny day tomorrow. :smilingsun:

 

these are in my native bed & with a little luck i can collect some seed. what's blooming in yer neck of the woods?

 

seed pods

pacific bleeding heart - Dicentra formosa

june 3, 2011

suburban garden

clark county washington - native

 

 

[Turtle]

i mentioned my two sub-species of big-leaf lupine back in post #238 and they are both in full bloom now. i just do what they tell me to do. :rose:

 

big-leaf lupines:

lupinus polyphyllus pallidipes in back, lupinus polyphyllus polyphyllus in fore.

 

 

[Turtle]

it's taken several days but i am 86.458% sure of this id. the sepals today have taken on a pinkish tinge. the plant came up volunteer in one of my flower beds. burke herbarium map doesn't show it in my county, but it's only as good as the reports they receive. the usda site shows all of washington on their map.

 

 

yellow columbine @ burke herbarium

yellow columbine @ usda

 

yellow columbine - Aquilegia flavescens

june 4, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - native

 

bloom:

 

whole-plant view:

[Turtle]

certainly one drawback to out-of-yard fieldwork is that i usually never get back to a site or if so not on a daily basis and so there is no seeing the different stages of flowering. at any rate, this captive yellow columbine is undeniably pink/rose in the sepals today wheras they started white. i see this also in fringecups & western trillium, though it's their petals that change. well, here's the money shot of the yellow columbine. i read in one of my fieldguides that only humingbirds and some moths with long tongues can reach the honey/nector gland in the end of the spur & had to know more of course. ;) the quote is just a snippet of the good info i found at this link & there are some nice photos as well. say nectar!!

 

blog source

...Flower design is all about getting pollen from the stamens to the pistils (female organs); form definitely follows function.What, then, has led to the development of these seemingly superfluous spurs? One clue is that they are of widely varying lengths. North American columbines range in spur length from from 7.5 to 123 mm (0.35 to 4.8 in.). And, because the first columbine—bearing a flower with short spurs— reached North America via the Bering Strait land bridge, between 10,000 and 40,000 years ago, all this change has taken place in a relatively short time, indicating some big payoff for the plant, in terms of survival or reproduction.

 

The columbine has both male and female parts in each flower, allowing for self-pollination, but that would not introduce any genetic variation. So the flower of the columbine is an elaborate package which has evolved to get effective pollination from its principal pollinators: bees, hummingbirds, and hawkmoths. And the spurs are an integral part of the process…

 

.,..

 

[Turtle]

i set the cam up for an hour today in hopes of catching a hawk moth or hummingbird feeding. didn't get that, but i did get a bumblee bee rejecting the yellow columbine. this bloom seems pretty long-lived and as you can see in the images there are 4 or more buds yet to open. :bouquet: still reviewing the literature to assure myself of the id. i guess i'm most concerned it's a cultivar but not sure if they are common. :shrug: i'm also thinking it may have been there last year but not bloomed, a biennial, and that i left it 'cause i thought it may be the female western meadowrue for my lonely male which has already bloomed and done. jilted & wilted. :wilted: very similar leaves have they to the columbine. well, i do run on.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdJ_MN35QRI

[Turtle]

this native plant is so common that i couldn't believe that i had overlooked it for booking & so i scoured my nooks & crannies double over. nope; nada. :doh: tiny flower is an understatement.

 

 

common bedstraw @ burke herbarium

 

common bedstraw - Galium aparine (aka common cleavers, goose-grass, sticky-willy)

june 6, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - native

 

blooms:

 

whole-plant view:

[Turtle]

found this in an empty lot last saturday.

 

 

 

european bugloss @ burke herbarium

 

european bugloss - Anchusa arvensis (aka small bugloss)

june 4, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - introduced

 

blooms:

 

whole-plant view:

[Turtle]

found this in the same lot as the bugloss. had some depth-of-field probs with the auto focus. :rant: who am i gonna call? :shrug:

 

english plantain @ burke herbarium

 

english plantain - Plantago lanceolata (aka ribwort plantain, narrowleaf plantain)

june 4, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - introduced

 

bloom:

 

whole-plant view:

[Turtle]

another wildflower from last saturday's empty-lot-walkabout that took some major sleuthing. i was getting nowhere fast searching all white flowers so i keyed off the 4 petals & searched the burke site for the Brassicaceae Family. got it!! darned invaders!!

 

wild radish @ burke herbarium

 

wild radish - Raphanus raphanistrum (aka jointed charlock)

june 4, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington -introduced

 

blooms:

 

whole-plant view with leaf & seed-pod details:

[Turtle]

this is the last flower from the empty lot trek. i've worried it every way from sunday and can only say - with 86.359% certainty- that it is a hawkweed. i didn't bother to collect it & seems the seeds may be an identifying feature. i'll be keeping it in the back of my mind, or as much of it as has not leaked out. her we goes thens. . . . . .... .

 

 

 

Genus Hieracium @ burke herbarium

 

hawkweed - Hieracium sp.?

june 4, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - ?

 

bloom:

 

whole-plant view with leaf detail:

[Turtle]

took a father's day stroll in a park today and found some old friends & some new. lots of signs though saying it's a habitat area and stay on the trail. consequently i couldn't get to some blooms in the bush. :naughty: :omg: fortunately this wildflower was on the trail, but unfortunately it's introdouched from the mediterranean. :doh: avast there!!! but i digress. . . . . .. . :rose:

 

 

yellow parentucellia @ burke herbarium

 

yellow parentucellia - Parentucellia viscosa (aka yellow glandweed)

june 19, 2011

suburban park trail

clark county washington - introduced

 

blooms:

 

whole-plant view:

[Turtle]

took a while for this to bloom in one of my garden beds and now that it has i swear by odin that not even fibonacci can save it and that this oxeye will not go to seed.

 

oxeye daisy @ burke herbarium

 

oxeye daisy - Leucanthemum vulgare

july 2, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - introduced

 

bloom:

 

whole-plant view with involucre & leaf detail:

[Turtle]

just behind the last invader now moldering in the compost, another awaits the same fate. i may taste this one before i give it the heave-ho.

 

 

wall lettuce @ burke herbarium

 

 

wall lettuce - Mycelis muralis (aka wall-lettuce)

july 2, 2011

suburbia

clark county washington - introduced

 

blooms:

 

stem & leaf detail:

[Turtle]

well, 2 weeks older & only a little worse for the wear. so my suspected "asters" grew to nearly 7 feet before blooming and they weren't asters at all, rather they were chicory, aka blue sailors. i did shoot one a year or too ago, but only the blooms and it was a small plant on the road margin. then too when i collected the seeds @ green mountain i was even more a novice then now & obviously mistook the flower for an aster. :doh: live & learn. as soon as i recognized them, out they came!

 

now on the "yellow columbine", i am a little less sure on the species than i stated earlier, but at least there is no error on the genus. all in all the plant produced 6 or 7 blooms & i never did see a moth or hummingbird at them. the plant is now going to seed & hosting aphids. attached below are shots of the seed head & seeds.

 

speaking of aphids, one sub-species of my lupine -lupinus polyphyllus palidipes- was infested with them, while the other, lupinus polyphylus polyphylus, had none. :shrug: anyway, they were attracting a gopher, which i seem to have rid myself of in the last 5 days after years of trying, so i dug out every lupine i had & threw them in the compost.

 

so it goes. . . .. . . . . . . . . .... . . .. . :rose: