Getting Started

I've thought about blogging about my wildflower finds for awhile now.  I walk the trail at Lone Pine on a regular basis and enjoy noticing the changes in flora as the spring and summer unfold.  So this will be a start toward that end, updating what is in bloom on a weekly basis.  Of course, I have a few months in 2013 to catch up on!

Might as well start when I took a walk at Lone Pine back in January when the trail was ice.  With poles in hand and grippers on my boots, I took notice of the little bits of beauty that are around no matter the season.

Seedheads of Blue Flax

Rocky Mountain Maple seeds

Low Oregon grape leave

Chokecherry leftovers

In February, Colter and Alli were skiing with Warren and I took Kyler for a walk.  You can see how icy the trail had gotten.

Kyler (Alli and Colter's dog) on the trail

Looking east from the top of the hill.

Since I slipped and fell on this walk, twisting my knee and skinning up my chin, I decided that ice-walking was not such a good idea, and I would wait for things to thaw before I came back!

My next visit to Lone Pine wasn't until the end of March, at the start of our Spring Break.  The ice was gone but the flowers were still sleeping.  There is a spot where I always find fairyslippers, and sure enough, some little leaves were emerging and getting things started.

Fairyslipper leaves

The other thing that caught my eye was this tree with blue sap!  I had to study it to see if it wasn't candle wax or something.  I have no idea why it would look blue rather than a golden color.

Then finally on April 3rd there were little yellow dots to greet me as I climbed to the top of a grassy knoll.

Yellowbell--fritillaria

Not very big!

I came again on April 5th.

Things are starting to bud and develop.

Then on April 8th, Monday morning, back to school after spring break, we had several inches of snow to greet us!

So when I got to school, I started thinking about all the little fritillarias up at Lone Pine and wondered what the snow would do to them.  So on my lunch break I drove up to the top and took a quick walk to see.  What little troopers!  Most of them were buried, but a few held their lamps up above the snow.

I'm sure the snow brought good moisture to the ground and will help the other lovelies get going there.
On April 12th I hiked the loop after school and though it hasn't warmed up very much, the snow is gone and some new flowers are starting to show.

Prairie-star

Yellow Parsley

Buttercups

And of course the Fritillaria are still lovely.