If I’m seeing our beautiful native blue flag irises it must be June. And this year I’m seeing them everywhere, so it must be a great year for them. The name flag is from the Middle English flagge, which means rush or reed, and which I assume applies to the cattail like leaves of an iris.
Though Native Americans used blue flag irises medicinally its roots are considered dangerously toxic and people who dig cattail roots to eat have to be very careful that there are no irises growing among them, because the two plants often grow side by side. Natives showed early settlers how to use small amounts of the dried root safely as a cathartic and diuretic, but unless one is absolutely sure of what they’re doing its best to just admire this one. It’s an easy thing to admire.
Our meadows and roadsides are just coming into bloom and the maiden pink (Dianthus deltoids) in the above photo was found at the edge of a meadow. It might look like its cousin the Deptford pink (Dianthus armeria,) but that flower doesn’t have the jagged red ring around its center like this one does and it blooms later, usually in July. Maiden pinks are originally from Europe and have escaped cultivation but aren’t terribly invasive. They seem to prefer the edges of open lawns and meadows. Their colors can vary from almost white to deep magenta. I have volunteers growing in my lawn and I mow around them. They’re too beautiful to just cut down.
In 2015 the highway department replaced a bridge over the Ashuelot River and widened the road leading to and from it. They put what I thought was grass seed down on the roadsides once the bridge was finished, but it was wildflower / grass seed mix containing lupines (Lupinus.) For a couple of years they were growing all along the sides of the road but this year there are just a few. That could be because they are an aphid magnet and I saw many in this colony covered with the sucking insects. I’ve always loved lupines and I’m always happy to see them come into bloom. I hope they survive in this spot.
The lupines come in light and dark shades in this spot, but they also come in pink, white, red, and even yellow.
Lesser stitchwort (Stellaria graminea) blooms among the tall grasses. This plant is originally from Europe and is also called common or grass leaved stitchwort. It like disturbed soil and does well on roadsides, old fields, and meadows. The Stellaria, part of its scientific name means star like, and the common name Stitchwort refers to the plant being used in herbal remedies to cure the pain in the side that we call a stitch.
I find purple dead nettle (Lamium maculatum) growing in a local park. It’s a beautiful little plant that makes a great choice for shady areas. It is also an excellent source of pollen for bees. Dead nettles are native to Europe and Asia, but though they do spread some they don’t seem to be invasive here. The name dead nettle comes from their not being able sting like a true nettle, which they aren’t related to. I’m guessing the “nettle” part of the name refers to the leaves, which would look a bit like nettle leaves if it weren’t for their variegation, which consists of a cream colored stripe down the center of each leaf.
Wild geraniums (Geranium maculatum) have just started blooming. Other common names include alum root, old maid’s nightcap and shameface. In Europe it is called cranesbill because the seed pod resembles a crane’s bill. The Native American Mesquakie tribe brewed a root tea for toothache from wild geranium, but I’m not sure if it’s toxic. Much Native knowledge was lost and we can’t always use plants as they did. Somehow they knew how to remove, weaken or withstand the toxicity of many plants that we now find too toxic for our use.
I’ve told this story many times but I’ll tell it once more for the more recent readers: When I was just a young boy living with my father I decided that our yard needed a facelift. We had a beautiful cabbage rose hedge and a white lilac, and a Lorelai bearded iris that my mother planted before she died but I wanted more. I used to walk the Boston and Maine railroad tracks to get to my grandmother’s house and I’d see these beautiful blue flowers growing along the tracks, so one day I dug one up and planted it in the yard. My father was quiet until I had planted 3 or 4 of them, and then he finally asked me why I was bringing home those “dammed old weeds.” He also walked the tracks to get to work and back, so he saw the tradescantia (Tradescantia virginiana) plants just as often as I did. Though I thought they were lost and needed to be rescued, he thought somebody threw them away and wished they’d have thrown them just a little farther. We had blue flowers in the yard for a while though, and today every time I see this plant I think of my father. I’m sure everyone has plants that come with memories attached, and this is just one of mine.
Though my color finding software sees some purple in the previous tradescantia photo I think it was just the play of light on its petals. This one is the real purple one. I don’t know its name but it grows in a local park. It’s pretty but my favorite is the blue one.
I don’t think I could imagine more beautiful colors and shapes in a flower than those found on the perennial bachelor’s button (Centaurea). They make excellent low maintenance, almost indestructible additions to the perennial garden. I found this one growing in a local park.
Dogwood (Cornus) blossoms have 4 large white bracts surrounding the actual small greenish flowers in the center. They have just come into bloom.
Bunchberry is also called creeping dogwood and bunchberry dogwood. Can you see the resemblance to the dogwood blossom we just saw? Just like that dogwood the large (relatively) white bracts of bunchberry surround the actual flowers, which are greenish and very small. The entire flower cluster with bracts and all is often no bigger than an inch and a half across. Later on the flowers will become a bunch of bright red berries which give it its common name. Even the plant’s leaves show the same veining as the dogwood tree. Native Americans used the berries as food and made a tea from the ground root to treat colic in infants. The Cree tribe called the berry “kawiskowimin,” meaning “itchy chin berry” because rubbing the berries against your skin can cause a reaction that will make you itch.
Bunchberry (Cornus canadensis) is often found growing on and through tree trunks, stumps, and fallen logs but exactly why isn’t fully understood. It’s thought that it must get nutrients from the decaying wood, and because of its association with wood it’s a very difficult plant to establish in a garden. Native plants that are dug up will soon die off unless the natural growing conditions can be accurately reproduced, so it’s best to just admire it and let it be.
Sweet woodruff (Galium odoratum) has leaves that grow in a whorl, which you can see in this photo. This is a low growing summer wildflower with 4 petaled white flowers that seems to prefer the shade at the edges of forests. It makes an excellent old fashioned groundcover which, if given plenty of water, will spread quickly. The odoratum part of the scientific name comes from the pleasant, very strong fragrance of its dried leaves. The dried leaves are often used in potpourris because the fragrance lasts for years. It is also called sweet scented bedstraw and is a native of Europe.
Each strap shaped, yellow “petal” on a yellow hawkweed flower head (Hieracium caespitosum) is actually a single, complete flower. The buds, stem, and leaves of the plant are all very hairy and the rosette of oval leaves at the base of the stem often turn deep purple in winter. The Ancient Greeks believed that hawks drank the sap of this plant to keep their eyesight sharp and so they named it hierax, which means hawk.
Golden clover (Trifolium campestre) is an 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.
I know that I just showed blue eyed grass (Sisyrinchium angustifolium) in my last flower post but I saw this quite large clump of them the other day and couldn’t resist a photo of it. It’s a very beautiful little flower.
When I was gardening professionally every yard seemed to have at least one bridal wreath spirea (Spiraea prunifolia) growing in it but now I hardly see them. The 6-8 foot shrubs are loaded with beautiful flowers right now but I suppose they’re considered old fashioned because you never see them at newer houses.
In Greek the word spirea means wreath, but the plant comes from China and Korea. Scottish plant explorer Robert Fortune originally found it in a garden in China in the 1800s but it grows naturally on rocky hillsides, where its long branches full of white flowers spill down like floral waterfalls.
Cow vetch (Vicia cracca) is a native of Europe and Asia that loves it here and has spread far and wide. According to the Invasive Plant Atlas of the United States the vining plant is present in every U.S. state. Cow vetch can have a taproot nearly a foot long and drops large numbers of seeds, so it is hard to eradicate. It is very similar to hairy vetch, but that plant has hairy stems. I like its color and it’s nice to see it sprinkled here and there among the tall grasses.
Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty, if only we have the eyes to see them. John Ruskin
Thanks for coming by.
A true feast for the eyes. And heart. As ever, thanks.
You’re welcome!
🙂
Another really beautiful post, Allen. I like to find Trifolium campestre on my walks here, though we call it Hop Trefoil and not Golden Clover because its seedheads look like Hop cones (Humulus lupulus) and also feel and sound like them too. I do like your beautiful blue flag irises very much!
Thank you Clare. These little clovers are very confusing because we have two Trifolium campestre and Trifolium aureum that are almost identical. Then we have two more that can be mistaken for these two! The difference is in the leaflets. Trifolium campestre has stalked leaflets and those of Trifolium aureum aren’t stalked. And the flowers of all 4 plants dry into hop like papery brown seed heads, making it even more confusing!
My goodness! How confusing!
There are so many beautiful flowers blooming at this time of year that there’s no way to pick a favorite, at least not for me. While I love seeing the flowers of early spring, they tend to be small but beautiful, but this time of year, the flowers are larger with more colors. I loved your photos of these flowers, especially the bachelor’s button, which seem to have fallen out of favor with gardeners once again. I think that it’s sad in a way, the way the taste in flowers goes in fads, when even the older, more common varieties look good in a garden if they are placed correctly.
Thanks Jerry! Yes, most of the flowers from now on are quite big and easier to see. I’m all for that!
I think people should give older varieties of plants a try. For one thing they’re often much tougher than the newer varieties. And they are still pretty!
My parents had a whole hedge of the bridalwreath spirea when I was growing up. There were two or three at our house when we first moved here, but I took them out in favor of other plants I currently find more interesting.
That must have been quite a hedge!
Thank you for posting such lovely photos & informative narrative. Memories sparked- my Mom used to refer to some plants as “dump flowers”. As an adult, I realized she was referring to Hosta & it’s late season flowers. Also in my childhood yard was bridal wreath. I agree, not so common these days, but a nice bush w/ great flowering. In my yard, the bush was full of ladybugs.
You’re welcome Sophie, and thank you. Your mother wouldn’t like my yard. I have hundreds of hostas!
I didn’t know that the bridal wreath attracted ladybugs. That’s interesting.
Thank you for the beautiful spring flower tour, Allen! There are many familiar faces here for me too, and some new.
You’re welcome Lavinia, and thank you.
I somehow missed your comment!
Another lovely selection. Many of the flowers are familiar to us over here and it is interesting to see ones that I don’t know as well.
Thank you. Yes, many from this post came originally from Europe so I’m not surprised that you would recognize them.
[…] https://nhgardensolutions.wordpress.com/2018/06/06/late-may-early-june-flowers-3/ […]
Thank you.
Great roundup, Allen. We seem to share many of the same flowers. I will have to keep an eye out for bunchberry and my flowering dogwood is in bloom with only six flowers! We always have bridal wreath spires and we love the blooms.
And that is spirea of course.
https://polldaddy.com/js/rating/rating.js
I knew what you meant!
Thank you Cynthia. Yes, we do share many of the same wildflowers. Many of the scientific names end in “canadensis.”
Too bad about the dogwood. Maybe it got too cold over winter.
‘I’ve always liked that spirea but apparently younger people don’t.
I love reading your posts – you take beautiful photos of so many of the flowers (and trees and lichens and other stuff) that I love to see when I go outdoors.
I thought you might want to know that the lupine in your photo is probably Lupinus polyphyllus (ID based on the number of leaflets). This western variety is appearing more frequently in our eastern landscape. Although it is a beautiful flower, there is a lot of concern that the native variety – Lupinus perennis – is now rare/threatened/extirpated in much of New England, resulting in the Karner Blue butterfly (Lycaeides melissa samuelis) – the official state butterfly of New Hampshire – being added to the endangered species list.
The Karner Blue is endangered in New Hampshire and is also on the federal endangered species list:
https://wildlife.state.nh.us/wildlife/profiles/karner-blue-butterfly.html
Here is some info on the two species of Lupine:
https://gobotany.newenglandwild.org/species/lupinus/polyphyllus/
https://gobotany.newenglandwild.org/species/lupinus/perennis/
Thanks for sharing your stories – they remind me to get outdoors more often!
Stephanie Radner
Dedham MA
Thank you Stephanie. I’ve read a lot about the lupine / Karner blue association but I never thought I’d see a western lupine here. I assumed, since they were planted by the State Department of Transportation, that they would be native plants so I didn’t even bother with identities. I’ll have to go back and take a closer look and maybe tell the state DOT what they’re doing.
The wild Iris is really pretty. I don’t see them here. I love your photos of the pinks. We have a similar species, but it hasn’t shown up yet. You have some gorgeous flowers blooming now!
Thanks Montucky! Too bad you don’t have that iris. It adds a lot of color to ponds and other wet places at this time of year.
I’m looking forward to seeing your pinks. I’ll bet they’re beautiful.
We do have some real beauties blooming right now, and many more to come!
Thank you for helping me figure out the name of a shrub on our property in Peterborough — bridal wreath spirea! We have a gorgeous 6-foot shrub in the back yard of our 100-year-old home here and I’m glad to be able to identify it now. It blooms so beautifully every year.
You’re welcome Tammy, I’m glad I could help. That shrub might be nearly as old as the house!
Reblogged this on Poltrack Pix and commented:
I believe Sweet Woodruff is used to flavor May Wine. I have some nice colonies growing in shady parts of my yard. I love this plant.
Thank you John, I didn’t know that. I love sweet woodruff too but I don’t see it very often.
Thank you for these lovely photos, informative descriptions, and the personal stories that give your posts such breadth and depth. Always look forward to reading and seeing your blog. I owned and operated a full service organic gardening business for nearly 2 decades, love nature and wildflowers, and have many, many childhood memories related to the plant world – a kindred spirit. Thank you.
https://polldaddy.com/js/rating/rating.js
You’re welcome, and thank you. I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog.
Yes, it is used to flavor May wine. I take some cuttings, rinse them off, stuff them into the neck of a bottle of a not too dry white wine, where they somewhat magically straighten themselves out and look delicate and whole again. Leave for 2 days and you have a gently floral May wine. Sweet woodruff has little scent when just picked that I can discern, but after mulling in the wine for a bit, it becomes both spicey and floral. Makes a nice gift from the garden for friends, too.
https://polldaddy.com/js/rating/rating.js
Thank you for that. Next time I highlight sweet woodruff I’ll have to mention it.
Again and again I am so impressed not only with the colour but the beautiful shapes of the wildflowers you photograph so cleverly. Thank you for that quote too.
Thank you Susan. There does seem to be an endless variety of colors and shapes in the plant kingdom. I love to see all the variations.