We’ve been driving up into the mountains so much the last couple of weeks that we hadn’t wandered the wetlands trail that is less than a mile away from where we are staying for a bit. Some things had changed, the water was thicker with lily pads and new flowers were showing, and some things were the same, old flowers, but more abundant.
Water hemlock, pretty but deadly, the most toxic plant in North America, it’s best not to even touch it in case the sap accidentally enters your bloodstream through eyes, mouth, or cuts in the skin.
The lily pads have gotten so thick it is difficult to tell that there is even water out there in some places! The one I got close enough to identify was spatterdock (yellow pond lily), the birds that we saw flitting around over the water were most red wing blackbirds, one of my favorites.
Foxglove beardtongue, red clover, and Deptford pinks
Crawdad (local name for crayfish, a freshwater crustacean, all of us outdoorsy kids grow up trying to catch them in creeks) chimney and two golden harvestman on a poke leaf
Spatterdock, sallow sedge, and bankclimber (freshwater mussel) shell
A part of the lake where the lily pads are not too thick to see the water.
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Native wildflowers from my previous job. All pics by me. Not an exhaustive list. Split into multiple posts due to the image limit.
Starting off with everyone's (read: monarch butterflies') favorite: milkweed. Common milkweed is on the left. I think what we called common milkweed was actually 2 closely-related species. On the right is swam milkweed, which likes wetter soil. Butterfly weed in the bottom is a milkweed, but its sap is clear instead of white so some people don't realize that. It's also much shorter than most milkweeds.
We have 2 main gentian species. These flowers don't open all the way and only larger insects like bees can force their way in. These bees then seek out gentians as an exclusive food source, making it more likely for them to pollinate the gentians. Cream gentian (left) is white and can get very tall on good years. Bottle gentian (right) is a small, low-lying plant that hides under other plants. This picture was taken early in the season so they're pretty pale. They turn bright blue when they're in bloom.
Yellow (left) and purple (right) coneflower
Mountain mint (right) and downy wood mint (left)
Wild raspberry (left) and dewberry (right). My personal nemeses when I was moving through the prairie. Thorns are not my friend
Foxglove beardtongue, which comes in a common white color (right) and a rarer purple variant (left). Below is false foxglove, which is a hemiparasite (plant that gains nutrition through parasitism and photosynthesis) that leaches off of oak roots
Bee balm, this one has a lot of ornamental cultivars
Rattlesnake master, a badass name for a weird and spiky plant
Ironweed. We have a few species and I don't know how to tell them apart
Wild quinine. In the 3 growth seasons I worked here, this one became much more common.
Prairie coreopsis (left) and tall coreopsis (right). Guess what the difference between these two is
Rosinweed (left) and cup plant (right). Two closely related species.
Maryland senna (left) and partridge pea (right). Similar (but not closely related) species that grow pods full of seeds. As they dry, the pods peel open and send the seeds flying out.
Prairie dock. These grow very tall and have huge leaves that are cool because the roots bring up water from deep underground
Ashy sunflower, a hemiparasite that kills goldenrod and tall grasses. As those two are very aggressive plants that can take over whole fields. ashy sunflower seeds are a great way to fight back against them and help increase biodiversity.
Cardinal flower. This one is endangered so its great that it's doing well and even spreading where I worked.
Common thistle. This one is unfortunately losing ground to invasive Canada thistle (not actually from Canada) and isn't very popular, but bugs love it.
Black-eyed Susan (left) and sweet black-eyed Susan (right). The latter is larger and doesn't tolerate shade as well.
