More Mid July Flowers

Pickerel weed likes to grow in shallow water and the large amounts of it growing along the shoreline of the Ashuelot River tell the story of how low the water level is. We still haven’t seen any more rain than a quick moving downpour or two and I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much pickerel weed here.

Ping pong ball size buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis) flower heads look like frilly pincushions with their long white styles sticking out of the tubular the way they do. This native shrub is almost always seen near water and I found this one on the banks of the Ashuelot River. Once the flowers go by a red seed head will form, which will turn brown as the seeds ripen. Waterfowl of all kinds love the seeds which, since buttonbush grows near water, are easy for them to get to.

Joe Pye is thought to have been a Native American healer who used this plant to treat early Massachusetts Bay Colony settlers suffering from typhoid fever, but the discussion over the origin of the name goes back and forth. For instance I’ve read that a Native word for the plant was “jopi,” which meant typhoid, and it is thought by some that jopi the plant name became Joe Pye the person name.

In any event Joe Pye weed (Eupatorium) is a common late summer sight in wet meadows. There are several species of this plant including hollow Joe-Pye-weed (E. fistulosum,) sweet Joe-Pye-weed (E. purpureum,) three-nerved Joe-Pye-weed (E. dubium,) and spotted Joe-Pye-weed (E. maculatum.) Hollow Joe-Pye weed is the most common species in this area.

There are enough different goldenrods (over a hundred it is said) which look enough alike to convince me that I don’t want to spend the rest of my life trying to identify them all, but some are quite easy to identify.  One of the easiest is gray goldenrod (Solidago nemoralis).  It’s one of the first to bloom and its flower heads always look like they have been in a strong wind that blew them over to one side of the stem.

Queen Anne’s lace (Daucus carota) is having a good year and I see the big flower heads everywhere, but despite their abundance I’m not finding more flower heads with the tiny purple / reddish floret at their center. Though another name for this plant is “wild carrot” you had better know exactly what you’re doing if you dig and eat the root because there are very similar plants like water hemlock (Cicuta maculata) that are among the most toxic plants known.

Legend says the tiny purplish / reddish flower at the center of the flower head is a drop of blood shed when Queen Anne pricked herself while making the lace. A more believable story says that it helps attract pollinators but the truth is scientists don’t really know why it’s there. This example had plenty of insects on it but I don’t know if they were pollinators. They looked more like fleas.

Invasive rabbit’s foot clover (Trifolium arvense) is short enough to be forced to grow right at the edge of the road if it wants to get any sunshine, so the roads look like they have been festooned with fuzzy pink ribbons for a while each summer. It’s an annual that grows new from seed each year and the seedlings must be tough, because they don’t seem to mind being occasionally run over, or the poor dry soil found along the road side. In fact they seem to thrive in it. I see more plants each year.

Golden clover (Trifolium campestre) is another imported clover originally from Europe and Asia. It is also known as large trefoil and large hop clover. The plant was imported through Philadelphia in 1800 to be used as a pasture crop and now appears in most states on the east and west coasts, and much of Canada, but it is not generally considered aggressively invasive. Each pretty yellow flower head is packed with golden yellow pea-like flowers. I see the plant growing along roadsides and in sandy waste areas.

Liatris (Liatris spicata) is a plant native to our prairies and you don’t find it outside of gardens that often here in New Hampshire. Every now and then you can find a stray plant in a meadow but it isn’t anywhere near as aggressive as black eyed Susan and some other prairie plants. It is also called blazing star and is grown commercially as a cut flower. I think that the closer you get to the tiny flowers, the more beautiful they become. It’s a very useful plant for attracting butterflies to the garden. Native Americans baked and ate the roots of some of the more than 43 varieties of liatris. They are said to taste like carrots. Other parts of the plant were used medicinally to treat heart ailments.

Bull thistle (Cirsium vulgare) originally hails from Europe. It is thought to have been introduced in the colonial era and has spread throughout the United States, much to the dismay of farmers and cattle ranchers. It is also called spear thistle, with good reason. I don’t know if it was imported intentionally or accidentally. This example was in the middle of a huge plant, easily the biggest thistle plant that I’ve ever seen, and an ouch or two could be heard while I snapped the shutter.

Bees love the thistle blossoms and of course that’s exactly why it has been so successful in spreading.

Blue, bell shaped flowers all on one side of the stem can mean only one thing; creeping bellflower (Campanula rapunculoides.) The pretty flowered plant was introduced as an ornamental from Europe and has escaped gardens to live in dry places that get full sun. It is a late bloomer but is usually finished by the time goldenrods have their biggest flush of bloom. It is an invasive plant that is hard to get rid of once it has become established. It will choke out weaker native plants and seems to love colonizing gardens when it is left alone. I usually find it on forest edges.

If you are trying to attract wildlife to your yard and have a pond or a swampy area then our native winterberry (Ilex verticillata) is an excellent choice of native shrub. They like very wet soil and, like other hollies, need male and female plants to produce fruit. The white flowers are tiny; barely more than 1/8 inch across, and can have up to eight petals. When pollinated they will become bright red berries and, because the berries have a low fat content, birds and animals eat them quite late in the season, so the berries color the landscape for most of the winter.

I found some beautiful purple phlox growing on the unmown side of a road. The flower heads were quite large and anyone with a garden would have been happy to have had them in it. I’m guessing that’s just where it escaped from; I doubt that it’s native but it certainly is beautiful.

This is the first time pointed leaved tick trefoil (Desmodium glutinosum) has appeared on this blog because I’ve never seen it before. It’s a plant that doesn’t mind shade and I found a few blooming examples at the edge of a forest recently. I don’t have a good shot of the foliage but you can just make a few of the sharply pointed leaves out on the left side of this photo.

Bright purplish pink, stalked flowers are clustered in long straight spikes (racemes.) It’s easy to see that they’re in the pea family but unlike some pea flowers, the reproductive parts are not completely hidden. The white pistil rises up and out of the keel. If pollinated each flower will grow into a green, flat seed pod with 2 or 3 jointed triangular segments that are very sticky. The seed pods will even stick to bare skin and they are where the “tick” in tick trefoil comes from.

You have to look closely to see the slightly curved white pistil rising from the keel of the pointed leaved tick trefoil flower. I can’t think of another flower in the pea family like it.

Here’s a little flower that has had me scratching my head for about a week. Though I’ve looked in every wildflower book I own and have searched on line I can’t identify it. It grew in pure sand and full sunlight in a waste area by the side of a road. The plants were about 3-4 inches tall and had several blooms on each plant. The leaves were narrow and sword shaped, and pointed on the tip. Each flower is so small that I can see color but not the shape without help from a loupe or a photo. I’m guessing that each one is no more than 1/8 inch across-even smaller than those of red sandspurry. I wonder if anyone knows what it is. It’s a beautiful little think and I’d love to know its name.

You find peace by coming to terms with what you don’t know.  ~Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Thanks for stopping in.