This flower looks like it’s having a bad hair day but that ragged look attracts many pollinators.
Bee balm’s (Monarda didyma) nectar treat is deep inside those long, red tubes. Each tube is a flower with stamens and pistils just waiting to touch a visitor.
The color is red, the tube is long. It’s perfect for hummingbirds.
And for moths that resemble hummingbirds — like this hummingbird clearwing.
Love that tousled look.
(photos by Chuck Tague)
Here’s a beautiful wildflower that’s blooming now in western Pennsylvania.
Water willow (Justicia americana) attracts your attention because the plant is three feet tall with unusual flowers 1.5 inches across. The flowers are shaped almost like an iris, white with purple accents.
Water willow got its name from its two most obvious characteristics: it’s a perennial water plant and it has long leaves that resemble willow leaves.
But it’s not a willow. It grows from rhizomes in swamps or along the wet edges of streams, rivers, and ponds. You can’t grow it in your garden; it has to have wet feet.
Sharon Leadbitter found this one along the Allegheny River near the Tarentum Bridge. I’ve seen it growing in Slippery Rock Creek, the Youghiogeny River at Ohiopyle, and in Chartiers Creek at Boyce-Mayview wetlands.
If you visit the water’s edge this weekend, keep an eye out for water willow. You might find a large colony of it.
(photo by Sharon Leadbitter)
When I was growing up I didn’t know the name of these common summer flowers. Later on I learned to call them Railroad Lilies.
Their real name is Orange Daylilies (Hemerocallis fulva) and they’re a garden plant gone wild. As a cultivar from East Asia, their seeds are sterile so they spread by fibrous roots and rhizomes. Once established, they’re hard to get rid of and are even considered invasive in Wisconsin. (In Pennsylvania they’re on the invasive species Watch List.)
Their last name, daylily, comes from the fact that each flower blooms for only one day. Their choice of habitat earned them two nicknames: Ditch Lily and Railroad Lily.
They’re blooming now in Pennsylvania. Despite their weedy reputation they certainly dress up the landscape.
(photo from Wikimedia Commons. Click on the image to see the original)
There’s a bumper crop of pea pods on the redbud trees in Schenley Park.
Ten weeks ago the trees had delicate pink flowers and only a hint of leaves.
This month their trunks and branches are dripping with peas.
Normally the pods are hidden by the foliage but this year they’re so prolific you can see them easily. Check the redbud trees on the right as you descend the stairs behind the Visitors’ Center.
It’s a good year for the pea trees.
(photos by Kate St. John)
Yesterday I wrote about a rare butterfly, today a flower that’s rare in Pennsylvania.
Silverweed (Argentina anserina, formerly Potentilla anserina) is a low-growing plant of sandy soil that spreads by runners. It’s called silverweed because the hairs on its leaves give it a silver sheen. In Pennsylvania the only place it grows is Presque Isle State Park because that’s the only location with suitable habitat.
On a worldwide basis silverweed is not rare at all. It occurs in the northern hemisphere in Europe, North America and Asia. It’s as wide-ranging as Iceland and Tibet.
But for us it’s a treat to see. Dianne Machesney found only one plant at Presque Isle last Monday.
(photo by Dianne Machesney)
Lupine is a beautiful blue flower that’s a symbol of summer in northern North America. I used to believe (incorrectly) that it couldn’t grow as far south as Pennsylvania. Here it is blooming at Presque Isle State Park earlier this week.
In a patch of wild lupine we could dream that the endangered Karner Blue butterfly (Lycaeides melissa samuelis) would take up residence here, but it would be an impossible dream.
The Karner Blue (shown below) is totally dependent on native wild lupine for its life cycle. It lays its eggs on lupine. Its larvae eat lupine. It places its chrysalis on lupine. Fortunately the adults feed on many flowers but there would be no adults without lupine.
Native wild lupine is not enough. This butterfly prefers oak savanna or pine barren habitat. Unfortunately many of these places were cut down for farming and development or became forests due to fire suppression or the disappearance of gazing animals (buffalo). When the habitat disappeared, so did the butterfly. It’s now extirpated (locally extinct) through most of its range and listed as endangered.
Efforts have been made to restore the Karner Blue’s habitat and the butterfly itself in Ohio and New Hampshire. These have met with some success but the clock is ticking on this species because it requires one more thing. Where winters are cold it needs snow cover to protect its overwintering eggs, but snow cover is becoming rare too because the climate is changing into volatile extremes of heat and cold that melt the snow, then plunge the ground into a deep freeze.
Dependent on lupine and snow, this rare butterfly is unlikely to take up residence in Pennsylvania … ever.
(photo of wild lupine by Dianne Machesney. Photo of the Karner Blue from Wikimedia Commons; click on the butterfly to see the original photo.)
Here’s another beauty blooming now in western Pennsylvania.
Fringed polygala is only 3 to 6 inches tall so you’ll have to look closely to find it.
Dianne Machesney saw this one along the Butler Freeport Trail near Monroe Road. Today I’m going to go see it.
(photo by Dianne Machesney)
The big splash of spring wildflowers is over but there are some treats out there if you know where to look.
Last weekend Dianne Machesney visited the Butler-Freeport Trail and found wild columbine blooming. It’s also blooming at the Magee Marsh boardwalk in northwestern Ohio, the first time I’ve ever seen it there.
The hot weather in March put the plants ahead of schedule in Ohio just as they are here. Maybe I’ve finally seen what Magee Marsh vegetation looks like just after the warblers — and birders — are gone.
(photo by Dianne Machesney)
Have you ever noticed how many things are yellow in the Spring?
Many warblers are yellow — it helps them hide among yellow-green leaves. Many flowers are yellow — their pollinators are attracted to that color.
Golden ragwort (Packera aurea) is yellow too.
It’s blooming now in western Pennsylvania.
(photo by Dianne Machesney)
Mayapples (Podophyllum peltatum) got their name because they bloom in May.
Last Wednesday, April 25, I found the first ones blooming in Schenley Park. This feels very early but my records on Mayapple blooming times are sparse and unreliable. 🙁
The ones in Schenley may be three weeks ahead of schedule.
Perhaps they should be called April-apples this year.
(flower closeup by Dianne Machesney)