More Early August Flowers

The longer I do blog posting the more I’m amazed more by what I don’t see than what I do, and here is a perfect example of that; pearly everlasting (Anaphalis margaritacea.) I’ve told readers before that they’d never see pearly everlasting on this blog because it didn’t grow here but what I should have said was I had never seen it. Now I’ve found it twice in two days in two different places.  According to the USDA the plant gets its common name from the “pearl-white involucre bracts that surround the yellow disk flowers.” You can just see one of those disk flowers beginning to show in the center of this flower head. Native Americans used pearly everlasting for treatment of sores and rheumatism, and they also smoked it to treat colds and as a tobacco substitute. What I see far more of is sweet everlasting (Pseudognaphalium obtusifolium,) and they used that plant in much the same way.

But it is that time of year when some of our smallest and most beautiful wildflowers show themselves and field milkwort (Polygala sanguinea) is one of those. Its flowers are beautiful and unusual enough to make you want to sit beside them for a while and study them, and that’s just what I usually do. Milkworts get their name from the ancient Greeks, who thought they increased milk production in nursing mothers. The polygala part of the scientific name comes from the Greek polugalon or “much milk.”

On field milkwort flowers what look like petals arranged on a central stem are actually individual flowers packed into a raceme no bigger than the end of an average index finger. Each tiny overlapping flower has two large sepals, three small sepals, and three small petals that form a narrow tube. Several different kinds of bees help pollinate this plant, including bumblebees. Its flowers can be white, purple, pink, or green and I’ve noticed that the color can vary considerably from plant to plant.

This shot from a few years ago gives you a sense of the size of a field milkwort flowerhead. Still, as small August flowers go, it’s among the biggest.

The flowers of mullein (Verbascum thapsus) grow in a great long spike and they bloom from the bottom to the top. Once the blossoms reach the very top of the flower spike the plant is done. Native Americans used tea made from its large, gray green furry leaves to treat asthma and other respiratory ailments. It is also said to be useful as a relaxant and sleep aid.

Mullein is a biennial so like burdock and many other plants it flowers and dies in its second year of growth. It is considered a weed but if all of its flowers opened at once along its tall flower stalk I think it would be a prized garden specimen.

This photo is more about the red seed pods than the yellow flowers of Canada St. John’s wort (Hypericum canadense) because some St. John’s wort plants have red buds and others have red seed pods, and it can get very confusing.

This photo is all about the flower of Canada St. John’s wort; the smallest of all the St. John’s wort flowers. Each blossom wouldn’t even hide Lincoln’s head on a penny. In fact you could pick a bouquet of them and hide it behind a penny, so small are the blooms.

And here is a Canada St. John’s wort blossom on a penny. It’s one of the smallest flowers I try to photograph.

Brittle stem hemp nettle (Galeopsis tetrahit) is originally from Europe and Asia and is considered highly invasive in some areas, but it is relatively hard to find here. It’s an annual, growing new from seed each year. Its small purple flowers grow in whorls near the top of the plant, which is often branched.

Brittle stem hemp nettle flowers have a large 3 part lower lip where insects land. From there insects can follow dark purple stripes into the blossom. Once inside they’ll pick up some pollen from the 4 stamens that arc along the inside of the upper lip and hopefully pass it on to another flower. The 3/4 inch long flowers have long white hairs on their upper lip and the square stems are also covered in hairs. When you run your fingers over any part of the plant you can feel its stiff, bristly hairs but they don’t embed themselves in you, thankfully.

Sow thistle (Sonchus oleraceus) flowers look a lot like dandelions, but the rest of the plant doesn’t. Its flowers are held about 2 feet high on wiry stems, and its leaves have prickly edges. The seed heads look a bit like a dandelion seed head but are denser because of more seeds. This plant is considered a noxious weed in many places and comes from Europe and Asia. It was first reported in Pennsylvania in 1814 and is now in all but 8 states and most of Canada. This one grew right at the edge of a ditch I didn’t know was there and as I backed up to get a better shot I suddenly found myself lying on my back in the muddy ditch. Once I stopped laughing I came out of it feeling a little foolish but otherwise unscathed.

Here is a look at the edge of a sow thistle leaf. It feels as prickly as it looks.

When I started working where I do I found a single chicory plant (Cichorium intybus) growing in a 13 acre field that I mow each week. I mowed around the plant and let it be and then there were 3 or 4 plants, and then a few more, and now there is a forest of them. One recent day I found myself in the middle of this forest admiring all of these beautiful flowers and I suddenly had the strange sensation that I was lighter, almost as if gravity had been switched off and I was being carried away by the beauty that I saw. And for all of the rest of that day I felt light, as if I had little weight. It was very strange, but not uncomfortable. In fact I’d like for it to happen again. It reminded me of lying on my back in the grass as a boy, watching the clouds float past. Sometimes I felt as if I was floating then, too.

Beauty, according to Indian spiritual master Amit Ray, is the purest feeling of the soul. Beauty arises when the soul is satisfied he says, so on this day my soul must have been immensely satisfied.

And then I wondered if dragonflies like this Halloween pennant, perched atop a chicory plant, felt the same lightness I felt. And bees and butterflies? Do they have a sense of having any weight at all? Since they must know that they’ll float to earth if they stop moving their wings I’d guess the answer would be yes. Insects, especially dragonflies, do seem to have a certain amount of intelligence, because when I’m mowing this field dragonfly squadrons fly along on either side of me, knowing that the mower will scare insects up out of the grass. It’s an easy meal they don’t have to work too hard to get, and it’s always quite a remarkable thing to watch. No matter how fast or slow the mower goes they fly right along beside it.

Beautiful yes but every gardener’s nightmare come true, because creeping bellflower (Campanula rapunculoides) is virtually impossible to eradicate. I worked for years trying to remove it from a garden I once worked in and last I knew the plants were still thriving. I think the new owners must have come to see the futility of it all.  

White avens (Geum canadense) are everywhere this year, more than I’ve ever seen. Each flower is about a half inch across with 5 white petals and many anthers. The anthers start out white and then turn brown and you usually find both on each flower. Each flower becomes a seed head with hooked seeds that will stick to hair or clothing.

I saw a hosta blossom that had to be in this post because it showed perfectly why hostas are in the lily family. In fact another name for the plant is the plantain lily.

This very beautiful rosebay willowherb (Chamerion angustifolium) grows just off the side of an old dirt road at the edge of a swamp. At least I think it is rosebay willowherb; there seems to be some confusion among sources about the regions it grows in. According to the USDA it doesn’t grow in New England, but the University of Maine lists it in its database. Another name for the plant is fireweed and Henry David Thoreau mentions seeing great stands of it in 1857, so I’ve been wondering for years now if the USDA map is incorrect. If you live in New Hampshire and have seen this plant I’d love to hear from you.

Narrow leaved gentians (Gentiana linearis) grow alongside the same road that the rosebay willowherbs were on. Gentians of any kind are extremely rare in these parts and I’m always as excited to see them as I would be to see a field full of orchids. Narrow leaf gentians like moist, calcium rich soil and that’s one reason you don’t see them here very often, because our soil is generally acidic. Another reason is that the flowers never open so insects have to force their way in, and it takes a strong insect like a bumblebee to do so. Third is how its seeds are too small to interest birds and its foliage too bitter to interest herbivores. I love its beautiful deep blue color and I hope this small colony will spread. I’ve heard of other hidden colonies of it here and there as well.

Never has the earth been so lovely or the sun so bright as today. ~Chief Nikinapi

Thanks for coming by.