Time for a Wildflower Hunt

“What a lonely place it would be to have a world without a wildflower!” ― Roland R Kemler

Every spring I give myself at least one afternoon to go wildflower hunting. And so, since the sun was shining today and the wildflowers were bound to be blooming, I took off for the creek with the dogs, Marley and Frankie. That made them extra happy although Marley, being a not so young dog sort of like me being not so young myself, is tired tonight. He’s snoozing on his bed behind me. Now Frankie, he’s still out in the yard, ready just in case the coyotes start making noise. He’ll want Marley to come out and help him do some barking if that happens. Maybe Marley will be rested up enough by then.

The dogs aren’t interested in the wildflowers, but they have plenty to sniff out and some pools of water to cool off in while I’m finding the best flower pictures. I’ve picked just a few to share. I took a lot of pictures because well, it’s fun to take flower and creek pictures. The picture up top has a variety of flowers. There’s trillium, shooting star, purple phlox, and blue bells.

The yellow flower below is wood poppy although when I was a kid we always called them buttercups. That’s actually a different flower that grows over by the creek too. But whatever you call these yellow beauties they do brighten up a hillside.

I thought I wasn’t going to be able to find this one, the jack-in-the-pulpit. I’d spotted several of the leaves down the creek but no flower stem with the leaf. But then this one was blooming tight beside the path as I was climbing up the cliff from the creek to head to the house. I always feel like I miss spring when I don’t catch sight of this one.

Another one I enjoy seeing is ginger root. These blooms hide at the bottom of the leaves and can make for interesting attempts to get a good picture. But this one was right up on a moss covered rock showing its bloom without a problem. They bloom against the ground because they are pollinated by bugs that crawl instead of bees that fly.

Another flower that can sometimes be hard to capture in all its beauty is the bent head trillium. The bloom is under those big umbrella leaves. Sort of like the Mayapple flowers that have buds but aren’t blooming yet. The bent head trilliums are just getting started. They blanket some of the cliffsides and look beautiful. They come in this color and white and a light purple that looks like a mix of the colors.

Hope you enjoyed joining me for this wildflower walk. And to reward you for going along and for fun, leave a comment of your favorite wildflower here or wherever, and I’ll throw your name in my drawing hat to win your choice of one of my books. As always you have to be at least 18 years old to enter. We’ll make it a fast giveaway with the deadline to enter April 24, 2021 at midnight EST.

So which is your favorite wildflower?